


For It Shines Bright And Never Changes

by HerenorThereNearnorFar



Series: Not Yet Weary (Of This Frail World's Decay) [2]
Category: Kubo and the Two Strings (2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Amnesia, Dysfunctional Family, Eye Trauma, Gen, Harm to Children, Historical Fantasy, Look It's Not As Dark As It Sounds, TBI, The Moon People Do Not Do Child Rearing Right, The Sisters Have Issues, The Villagers Are Great, so much amnesia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-09
Updated: 2018-07-19
Packaged: 2018-08-20 07:33:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 91,551
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8241439
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HerenorThereNearnorFar/pseuds/HerenorThereNearnorFar
Summary: Our hero is surely lost. Eye stolen, memories lost, a hundred thousand ri away from home. So of course, he must be rescued.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> It's finally here, the long awaited AU to end all AUs. Thanks to everyone who wrote nice comments and pestered me into writing. You're the reason this is getting. Annotations at the end. (I did so much research for this.)
> 
> Now for the next chapter.

 

There are times when memories are clean and bright, like shards of moonlight reflecting off of a clear sea. Every sensation seems sharp and brand new, and through these memories we carry on the past and give a little jolt to the souls of those departed.

There are times when memories are not clear at all. Memories that hide behind clouds, memories that twist and turn, and rage like a storm, things forgotten and half remembered, and these memories are the darkest and most precious of all.

Nursery rhymes, the feel of your baby blanket, the sound of a voice long silenced, or a song no longer played. They haunt us, sweet ghosts, nagging at the mind, bringing back emotions too formless to name.

_Forget and you are lost._

We forget, we lose, we carry on.

Is that not the least of it?

 

 

The cemetery at dusk was a quiet place, even during the Bon Festival. The residents of the Sun Village were rightfully wary of things that went bump in the night; vengeful ghosts, bandits, and wild animals were nothing to scoff at. It was best to be safely within the village boundaries by sundown, ready to enjoy the nighttime festivities among living company.

Kubo the storyteller stayed alone. He was not bothered by most of the other villagers, because though they cared for him, they also regarded him as something of an exception to most rules. His magic and mind were both sharp, and he spoke with the same accent as his mother, strange and high bred. He was clearly of a different sort, and therefore he could be trusted to guard himself against most dangers, especially on the night when spirits danced.

(How right, and how wrong, they were.)

All around Kubo were family graves, carefully tended and shared among the small clans that populated the village. Aunts and cousins, mother and brothers, grand parents to the n-th degree. He was surrounded by families, except for his own.

He stared at the lantern, willing it to light up, willing himself to hear some ancestral voice. His father, a spare grandparent, a cousin?

“Kubo!” the voice behind him cut through his meditative glaring, and made him jump.

To his chagrin it wasn’t the ghost of some lisping ancestor come to tell him they were proud of him, that they loved him and they knew exactly what to do about his mother. It was just Mari, in her best pink robe, flowers in her hair.

“Kubo, are you coming to the fireworks this year?” she asked, leaning forward a little, like she was about to tackle him.

Kubo scrambled to his feet. “Mari, what are you doing here?” A thought struck him, “Where’s your papa?” Hosato was a doting parent, and overprotective to the extreme when it came to his only surviving family member. Kubo glanced at the sinking sun and found it lower than he liked, and dropping every minute.

Mari frowned, “We were all playing tag,” she clearly meant her and the other village children, “But I wanted to find you and see if you would come into town. You could finish your story at the festival. Everyone would love it!” She glanced conscientiously at Kubo’s forsaken paper lantern, “Unless you have to talk to someone.”

“No- I mean, my father. But I don’t think he’s coming.”

“Oh.” Mari leaned to look around him with curious eyes. “Do you want to put him in the river anyway?” she asked, politely.

Kubo shook his head. “I don’t think he wants to show up.” He scooped the lantern up, holding it lightly so it wouldn’t crumple. “ _Your_ father might on the other hand. And I need to go home to my mother.” It was getting late, and he could see the late summer moon low on the horizon, glowing golden as the sun disappeared. She would wake up without him and start to panic, he could practically hear her quivering voice now.

Mari snatched the lantern out of his loose grip and made for the riverbank, with determination on her round little face. Kubo grabbed uselessly at the back of her robe, stumbling after her. It had not been his day- he could still feel the sorrow and frustration and worry, like a knot of weeds in his chest- and he wasn’t prepared to deal with Mari’s spoiled impulsivity.

Something about twilight made the world dreamy. There was a quality of unrealness to the ground that slapped against his palms as he tripped over a rock, to the cool air that slid silken through his fingers as he tried to catch Mari, who weaved through the shadowy gravestones, always keeping one step ahead of him. Rich shades of blue darkened the trees and the sky was a palette of purples and pinks, vibrant and surreal. Fingers of mist curled off the river and he felt a tugging at the base of his spine, like something was pulling him away.

“Mari!” he said, trying to stay focused on the here, on the rippling river and the graves and the unlit lantern cradled against her chest, pale paper bright in the darkness. “Give it here!”

“It has to go in the river!” she shouted back, childish petulance tinged with a stubborn altruism. “Those are the rules!” She slid the lantern gently on the surface of the water, where it bobbed.

“He’s not here!” Kubo yelled as he finally reached her, and she shrank back at his sudden fury. “He didn’t want to talk to me, he didn’t show up, he’s not here!” Even to his own ears he sounded puerile, throwing a tantrum even more than Mari- who had just wanted to do the right thing. He was older than her, he should have been the bigger person.

He sank to his knees and reached out, trying to snag the lantern before it drifted further away, but it was just inches out of his reach. Mari knelt next to him and tried to help, but her arms were even shorter than his and neither of them could quite grab it. Kubo sat back defeated, and watched it trail after the line of lights sliding down the water into eternity.

“I’m sorry.” Mari whispered. She looked genuinely contrite and Kubo instantly regretted shouting.

“Hey, it’s okay,” he reassured her. A thought struck him and he swung his shamisen off his back. Mari’s face lit up as Kubo strummed a chord and the lantern on the water unfolded and shook itself out, spraying water droplets full of moonlight. “See, easy as that!”

The paper twisted under invisible hands, folding itself into the shape of a butterfly and flapped over to land in Mari’s hair. She giggled, delighted. Kubo grinned, and plucked on last string. The paper flattened and fell to the ground in soft sweeps, and as it did the lanterns on the river went out, one by one by one.

Kubo froze. Had he done that?

The sky was dark, he realized, the sun had disappeared completely below the horizon. In the sudden gloom the trees were draped with shadow and darkness seemed to creep along the ground.

He was filled with the certainty that he had done something very, very, wrong.

“Kubo….”

Mari whimpered and grabbed at his sleeve, and he knew the voice wasn’t her. It was too low, wicked amusement mixed in the sing song. He remembered his mother’s stories of the monsters waiting to grab him in the night, remembered her terror and stern admonitions to always be home by sun down.

“Kubo....”

He didn’t bother to look around for the source of the eerie call, just grabbed the paper off the ground and shoved it in his pack, gripped Mari’s hand tightly, and whispered, “Run.”

They ran.

Back through the gravestones that loomed like tiny temples consecrated to the god of the underworld, back through the heavy summer woods that leaned in as they passed. There was a laugh behind them- no, laughs?

“Rude boy, to run from his relatives who have waited so long to meet him.” someone said behind them, and even above the wind rushing in his ears Kubo could hear it all too well. It only made him want to run faster.

Mari’s breath was coming fast, a whistle of exertion as she tried to keep up in her festival kosode and nice sandals. Kubo held onto her tightly, until it felt like their hands would fuse together, like two pieces of metal pressed together under the blacksmith’s hammer.

“Come back, little boy! Say hello to your aunties.” The voices were getting closer, and the forest path seemed to stretch for miles ahead of them. They might as well try to make it to the village as try to reach the moon.

Okay, bad metaphor.

The Spirit Gate came in sight, its red posts and lintel reassuring and familiar, and Kubo started to hope again. It had sacred power, everyone always said so, and perhaps it could protect them.

“Kubo! Have you forgotten your manners?” A dark figure landed in front of them, a feathered cloak swirling around her. Her white mask, stark in it’s simplicity, seemed to smile coyly. The two children froze, both instinctively backing up a few steps, only to be stopped short by the sighing voice behind them.

“Let the human child go, and come home with us, Kubo,” the second sister invited, taking a step towards them. “You’ll love it.”

“This is my home!” Kubo snarled, pulling his shamisen close, trying to think of some way out. The mist coiled closer and no escape came to mind. Mari’s small, warm hand was still in his, and she was glaring at his aunts with fear and righteous fury, and he didn’t want to let go, couldn’t let go.

“Silly boy,” said the one between them and the gate, between them and freedom. “Don’t worry, you’ll see soon. All I need is one little thing…”

As she floated in their direction, feet just inches off the ground, Kubo made his move. He shoved Mari in the direction of the village, shouted for her to go and warn the others, and brought his hand down on the strings of the shamisen, not bothering with notes or rhythmicality. Paper poured out of his pack and flocked to his aunts, a flurry of colour in the darkness, swarming them.

His precious paper, bartered for and hoarded over the years by he and his mother, bought him a few precious seconds.

He could see Mari running through the Spirit Gate a blur of pink, the bright red of the gate itself, and the festival lights beyond it, celebrations in full swing to honor the spirits of the departed.

He almost thought he could make it.

Something grabbed him by the ankles and brought him toppling to the ground, yanked him back even though he tried to cling to the well trod earth of the path. Tendrils, soft and little slimy seemed to wrap around him, and when he looked down all her could see was darkness, more choking than the night sky.

One of the women- his aunts- had a pipe in her mouth and it leaked tenebrous clouds. Against the murk only their masked faces, lit up by the full moon, seemed real. Dead white ceramic and shining red lips drew near and Kubo struggled to escape, to no avail. All he managed to do was knock his shamisen out of his hands, and it fell to the ground to join the rest of his stuff.

“Let’s get the messy part over, shall we?” the nearer sister suggested, and her hand reached up to his face.

Kubo screamed.

It was ridiculous, but if he was going to get kidnapped by his evil relatives he wanted to go out protesting. Somewhat to his surprise, it worked. His aunt drew back, shoulders hitching, but as soon as she did her sister moved to take her place, gloved hand outstretched.

“Yukami!” his mother’s voice, more forceful than he’d heard it in years, cut through the panic and fear. He twisted, desperate to catch a glimpse of her face, to apologize and find reassurance and rescue. “Let him go!” She sounded scared.

He couldn’t see her, it was all darkness, and then his aunt grabbed his chin and yanked his face back around. She was looking past him, at his mother, and try as he might Kubo couldn’t break free and look at her too. There was just the moonlight, reflecting off of his aunt’s cold features.

The other sister was shouting and his mother was shouting but the one holding him was strangely still.

Then she wasn’t.

There was a flash of silver and pain exploded in the right side of his face. All he could see was red, for one instant.

His mother screamed and golden light filled Kubo’s vision... before the pain twisted and it was all gone.

 

 

 

Sariatu feels like she has been asleep for years. Dormant, like a bear in winter, saving up her energy for her child and the inevitable day he would have to be protected.

And she has _failed_.

Even after all that has changed, she knows her sisters well enough to imagine their grins, smug and self satisfied, like it’s all a game. Like her son isn’t bleeding again for their father’s bloody sake.

Karasu is practically gloating, the angle of her head and the tilt of her mask as telling as the widest smile would be on any normal human. Yukami is more reserved and her smoke is twisting wildly, grasping at Sariatu’s bare feet, scorching through the woods, eating up the columns of the torii gate, pouring into town. She hopes the villagers heeded her hurried shouts for them to get out. They have been so kind to her and Kubo- had been so kind.

The world is spinning around her, the moon beating down as mercilessly as the sun on the summer sea, and all she can truly see is Kubo, cradled in smog, so close and yet so far away. Still, she tries to steady her voice and her heart, musters up some hope that he can be saved.

The blue magic gathering at her fingertips is not as strong as it once was, but she is clever- or she was once. The highest ranked of her father’s servants, most beloved of his deadly daughters. Once, her sisters could not have hoped to be her match.

She gathers up the shreds of that ancient certainty and tries to put it in her words as she demands, “Let my son go. He is not yours. He never has been.”

“He always has been.” Karasu hisses, something raw underneath her cultivated courtly tones.

“He always will be,” Yukami adds, scorn biting boredom. “Has your human lover twisted your head so, sister mine, that you forget what you are? He is a child of heaven, as surely as you once were.”

“He is nothing like us,” Sariatu argues, taking measured steps forward, praying the shamisen is somewhere among the black smoke that hugs the ground, that Kubo was smart enough to keep it with him until the last. “He lives, he sleeps and eats and breathes,” she can’t help but plead and pray some little bit of the sisters she loved is still there.

(But the sisters she loved had always been cruel. They’d just gotten a bit more shameless about it in recent years. Grief had made them monsters in form as well as nature, but the cold had always been there.)

“He’ll learn!” Karasu retorted, every syllable like icicles snapping.

“Hush!” Yukami orders, then more softly, “Hush.” Kubo drifts toward her, still wrapped in noxious, inky smoke. There is a soft twang at Sariatu’s feet and she stoops to scoop up the shamisen, turning on her sisters before they can react. The instrument sits against her chest more naturally than a baby ever had. She learned to play millennia before she ever met a human child. Even so, the sight does not seem to overly alarm her sisters.

Yukami tilts her head downwards, so a wry smile seems to play over her dead white features. “So eager for a fight. If you wished to spar, sister, you needed only to say.”

“I don’t want to spar,” Sariatu said (says) through gritted teeth, trying to block out the pain in her head and the ache in her heart, the sense that it was all already over. That she was watching it all play out like a ritual dance, every move decided centuries ago. “I want my son.”

There is a woosh of smoke, and when it clears Karasu is carrying Kubo- more like one would hold a sack of grain than a child- and Yukami has her swords drawn. Sariatu is playing before the fumes stop stinging her eyes.

No bachi means she must be careful with the taut silk of the strings and Kubo’s presence means she must be gentle with her sisters, but she still manages to clear the nebulous fog surrounding them- ripples of music tearing the haze to shreds of dark magic. The second chord brings wind rushing towards her, pulling her sisters in, but her concentration breaks seconds in and so too does the magic.

Yukami’s hair, torn loose by the power that pushed and pulled her, streams around her face (or lack thereof). “Go home,” she spits, to Sariatu or Karasu, it’s hard to tell, but Karasu starts to glide off- still holding Kubo around the waist like a child holds an especially taken for granted doll.

Sariatu felt (feels) her her heart break. Every last wisp of power in her being spring into action, magic welling up as pain did from a wound, pouring out into her hands and the shamisen in them.

It’s a scream of enchantment that snaps a string, drives her to her knees, and tears the world asunder with light, blue and sharp as a winter moon. Yet when it clears Yukami is entangled in the branches of a tree and Karasu flies on like the crow who brings messages to the gods- only this time the message is Kubo.

Her baby, small and sweet and so brave.

Sariatu collapses-collapsed-will collapse? (Tenses and language are failing her and she cannot think in words, just emotions that resonate like grief-sick dirges, an all consuming sorrow in her chest.)

Her sister’s disdainful voice echoes above her, but she cannot make out the words and does not care to.

The scrape of a sword being drawn from a sheath is easier to understand, and she can make out the glint of metal pointed at her through the blur of pain, but even then Sariatu does not stir except to raise her chin, baring her neck.

It’s a challenge, but not one that she expects to be declined. With only the bleak moon watching, surely Yukami wouldn’t shy away from sororicide.

Sariatu counts her heartbeats as she waits, takes note of the exquisite pain of mortality. The feel of tears on her cheeks, the blinding ache that accompanied injury- emotional and physical. The breath of wind on her skin, soft as Hanzo’s breath.

Ten, then twenty, then thirty beats of waiting, and she begins to wonder.

Forty and Yukami pounces, not with steel but with coarse strength that rolls them both off the path and into the underbrush. Sariatu’s defensive instincts are atrophied but she still pulls herself in to avoid the tear of branches and her sister’s hands. Yukami grabs her shoulders and pulls her up, until they are facing each other in the shadows, sheltered from their father’s eyes.

She had always been the calculating one, the elder of Sariatu’s two younger sisters. She did not move hastily or out of unbridled anger, as their youngest twin did. Even now Yukami’s motions are slightly detached, her voice cool and her anger chill as it is bitter.

“Why?”

Words, it always comes back to words, and Sariatu’s so often elude her. All she can choke out is, “Love.”

Yukami slaps her. The pain is a bright star in her vision.

“You dare.” she whispers, “We loved you. And you betrayed us.”

Sariatu doesn’t both to explain. Her sister cannot even begin to comprehend. She looks away, to the dappled moonlight that falls on dirt next to her. “Does it matter? I did it, I do not regret it, and now you have taken everything from me.”

There is a contemplative silence from Yukami and then her cold hands are on Sariatu’s neck, pressing her down, fingers pressed to her lips. Something icy and metallic tasting hits Sariatu’s tongue, familiar and terrifying. She tries to squirm away, but Yukami holds her still, arms like tempered steel, until the taste of glacial silver slides down her throat.

“You want to live here? Then _live_ here. Watch this pathetic world wither away, let your star dim but never go out. Suffer that, sister, but do not die. You don’t deserve it.”

The elixir is heavy in her mouth and the damage already done. Sariatu spits it out anyway, before she lets herself crumple to the ground, the world a whirl of shadow and full moon radiance.

Yukami rose (rises) to her feet like a puppet on invisible strings and wiped her shining hand on the inside of her cloak, cold light smearing over the dark cloth.

Eternal winter, moondust, and acrid herbs on her tongue, Sariatu lays in the shadows until she sees the warm light of the sun… No, lanterns.

There are lanterns.

It is much preferable to moonlight.

 

 

 

 

There was no night or day in the Kingdom of the Moon. There was no need for it, for the most part. It was alright though. Kubo felt like he’d always set his own bedtimes.

The sun was a variable visitor, sometimes there and sometimes half hiding behind the earth, as it had when Kubo had first arrived, and there were patterns to it that he had barely begun to understand. From the moon the lunar cycle was not based on where the moon itself was, but rather where the earth and sun were located. A new moon was when they were closest to the sun and he could feel it’s warm light on his skin and imagine the brightness of it. A full moon meant cool shadows and the earth close by, though he could not see it.

He was blind, after all.

(He could imagine what it looked like though. Sparkling water that danced, land braised gold by wheat, woods that were dark and hummed with life. Grandfather and his aunts never described it as anything more than disappointing, but he could remember. Snippets of a life before, of a sense now stolen from him, they hid in the recesses of his mind, secret treasures just for him.)

Kubo managed, of course. He put himself to bed, in a bed of pilfered cushions and silk robes finer than anything he’d ever felt before. He woke up sometime later, and tried to keep on some sort of schedule, to mark some passage of the days. He had a feeling that was something humans did.

He awoke now, and waited.

In a few minutes the little paper soldier who stood by his bed would come to prod at him. A small magic, one Grandfather didn’t know about. Kubo wasn’t about to tell him. He still needed hints and cheats, prodding from his auntys and little enchantments to keep him from blundering around the heavenly court. There was no harm to it, really, he told himself, but Grandfather most definitely would not approve.

In the meantime he traced the patterns on his makeshift blankets, the texture of brocades and the heavy richness and fine delicacy of silks. He could feel embroidery and even the slight weight of dyes if he tried hard enough, could feel the seams and make out the nearly unnoticeable stitching. Kubo was nearly certain he’d never had anything this fine when he’d lived as a human.

It was hard to remember, sometimes.

He shifted, burying himself deeper in the nest of regalia, until he couldn’t feel the cool, still air of the outside room anymore. It was always a perfect temperature on the moon, Grandfather made a point of it, but sometimes you just wanted to roast. He had done that with mother, sometimes, in the winter months. He would snuggle up next to her and she’d wrap her many layers of robes around him, and then they’d wrap their handful of blankets around themselves and just sit, snug and secure even if the wind was howling outside.

There was no wind, barely even breezes, in the kingdom of the heavens. But it was still nice to feel safe, in a small place that he and he alone controlled.

A tiny paper sword prodded him and he curled up tighter.

“Go away.”

There was a pause and then another gentle prod. Kubo groaned. The tiny soldier, who Kubo had named Yori, began tugging at the layers of robe-blankets, and Kubo finally gave in and shoved his way out of his cocoon.

Satisfied, Yori took back up his post next to the corner where Kubo slept; he could hear the rustle of little paper feet against the wood floor, shuffling to attention.

Kubo took careful steps across the room, counting in his head as he did so. When he reached the straw mat in the middle of the room he bent, and picked up the sword laying there. Grandfather insisted, and Kubo obeyed, even though it was too long for him to wear properly. The scabbard reached down almost to the bottom of his voluminous trousers, hit his side when he ran, and he was certain he looked silly with it; just like he was certain his long sleeves and heavy jacket were too big for him. He had no idea how his mother had managed with so much _fabric_.

Kubo pulled back his hair, washed his hands, and poked at the pot of rice powder someone had given him before deciding to leave it be. The feathered cloak was the last, most vital, part of the ensemble and he checked twice that it was on correctly, aunty Karasu giggled at him when it wasn’t.

He listened closely before stepping out the door, not eager to get caught by some celestial courtier or worse, one of his relatives. Best if they didn’t see him until after he’d taken care of the human side of things. It always made them uncomfortable.

Kubo trotted down the halls, carefully listening for any sign of fellow pedestrians. But other than the gentle trickle of water in the gardens, the perfect coos of birds, and the quiet strains of tasteful music above it all, there was nothing.

He’d thank the heavens if he wasn’t already in them.

There was the usual tray of food waiting for him in the little room off of one of the central courtyards, set aside for Kubo to eat and handle other distasteful activities. When he had first arrived the rich food- gelatinous rice cakes, sweet roots, and fragrant chestnuts- had delighted Kubo. After weeks of it, he was getting tired, but he ate up anyways, carefully finishing everything and sweeping a hand over the strangely smooth tray to make sure no crumb had escaped him before sliding it back somewhere it would not offend the delicate sensibilities of the moon people.

Then he went to go find his grandfather.

Luckily, it wasn’t hard, even for someone highly impaired in the visual department. The haunting sound of Grandfather’s shamisen, slow and dignified, was simple to follow. The sprawl of the courtly city was all clean lines and impossibly perfect surfaces, easy to navigate. All he had to do was try not to run into screens or walls, of which there were many, and ignore the quiet passing of judgemental courtiers.

“Kubo.”

“Grandfather.” He bowed low in the general direction of the voice and made his painstaking way across the room, heedful of obstacles. Grandfather sighed as Kubo knelt on the nearest mat, and started feeling around for the second shamisen he knew from experience would be nearby.

“You still have not learned to see, have you?”

“I can’t see, Grandfather,” Kubo reminded him, a hint of reproach in his voice. “You took both my eyes.” He tugged at the shamisen strings, checking that they were all well wound and tuned, reveling in the familiar feel of taut silk pressing into his fingertips.

“Irrelevant.” Grandfather made blindness sound like a minor inconvenience. “You can see without your eyes, child. It should come naturally to you. Simply know the world around you. Sense the position of everything in your surroundings.”

Kubo shrugged. “I don’t know how. I am not like you, honoured Grandfather,” he bit his lip before impulsively adding, “I am half human.”

So he had been told, when he had awakened in the heavenly kingdom, and honestly even if no one had informed him, he thought he would have figured it out. There was a father shaped hole in his memories, a sense that there was knowledge that he had once possessed and now no longer did. Sometimes a memory of his mother would fade out, or feel disjointed, as if some piece of it was missing.

(They said that they had erased the human world from his mind, that his mother, a being of the heavens, could not be so easily forgotten. He suspected there was more to it than that. He suspected a lot.)

Grandfather’s offended silence said it all. He hated to be reminded even of mother, and he couldn’t stand the idea that any part of Kubo was made for the earthly plane. Kubo had learned fast that attempts to bring up his past would result in stonewalling and scoldings, at least if he did it directly. A more roundabout method yielded better results, so Kubo adopted an air of meek innocence and only mentioned it when he could argue it was relevant.

“You will learn.” Grandfather said finally, in a cold voice. “You are not yet fully grown,” - that was another thing he hated, the fact that Kubo still had growing to do, that he was a child in a realm of endless, staid immortality- “And I am certain the skill will come to you over time. In the meanwhile try not to be to so clumsy. You sounded like a stumbling fool walking down here.”

“Yes, Grandfather.” Kubo said, making a face with full confidence no one in the room could see it. Grandfather was not impressed by vocal sarcasm, but Kubo had discovered he could cross his eyes and stick out his tongue to his heart’s content, provided no one more sighted was in the room.

“Now, shall we play?”

Kubo brightened at the suggestion, and lifted his shamisen happily. His new family might have been…. complicated, but he couldn’t deny that playing with Grandfather was amazing. His mother had taught him, yes, but they’d never been able to play duets together. The sound of two instruments in harmony was better than he could have imagined, and he was learning new techniques and chants as well.

He thought, maybe, this was what family was about.

(It wasn’t perfect, there were still holes in his heart and his head, but Kubo was was used to settling for less than perfection. Grandfather was not, so it was better not to tell him- Kubo could figure everything out on his own.)

 

 

 

The moon was full and Sariatu was in someone’s bed, light streaming through the window to rest on her face, night and luminesence filling her with the magic that flourished in times of quiet. There is a power in darkness and in the soft, dreamy glow of the stars, and much as she hated it, Sariatu was still dependent on it.

She stirred and sat up, a strength she hadn’t felt in years filling her limbs, a rare clarity to her mind. It took her a second to remember why she felt born anew and then she couldn’t help the sob that ripped its way from her throat.

Kubo.

There were loud and hurried sounds and a familiar face appeared at the door, a human face. Thin, and worried, but kind, hovering above a faded indigo jacket and trousers. She recognized it, but even with her mind clearer than it has been in years, she couldn’t quite put a name to the face.

“You’re awake?” he asked, shock evident on his features. A smaller figure, in an undyed kosode, peered around the door lintel, but the older man quickly shooed her away, with a gentle but stern, “Mari, go back to bed.” The child acquiesced sleepily, stumbling off, and the sense of familiarity heightened.

“I know you?” Sariatu said, confusion adding a lilt of question to her voice.

He nodded, “I am Hosato, the potter. I asked for your help a few years ago when my wife-”

“Ah.”

He had not been the first of the villagers to beg Sariatu’s assistance with an ill family member. Doing little spells, to strengthen cord, bring rain, or call a missing fisherman home, had been how she had supported herself and Kubo for those first few years, before her mind had deteriorated; but healing had always escaped her, no matter how she tried.

Hosato had known that when he had come to her, those many years ago, but he had asked anyways. The monks and midwives had already tried their best, and had not made much of a difference to his fast fading spouse. She’d spent hours, trying to remember what she could of childbirth and the dangers that accompanied it, trying to sing out the fever and infection, and failing. Even at her full power, she had not been made to heal, or to deal with the myriad weaknesses of humankind. He’d clutched his newborn daughter tight and thanked her, she’d turned down payment and gone home to shower Kubo in kisses. The memory was fuzzy, but it was there.

“We all- we all thought you would die,” Hosato said, still looking at her like she had just risen from the grave.

Sariatu pressed a hand to her temple, where pain was already beginning to coalesce. The room bobbed in and out of focus, and her mouth was dry as the center of a sun. “Why?” she rasped, as fragments of mortality began to slowly reassert themselves.

Hosato glanced out the high window, at the shining moon, then back at Sariatu. “It’s been a month, almost to the day,” he said gingerly, and Sariatu’s breath caught in her throat.

A month. A month that they’d had her son. A month for her body to recover the trauma of being forced to ingest a sliver of time without end.

Hosato was still speaking, but she could only make out snippets; “didn’t eat...”, “everyone assumed…”, “a miracle!”

“A miracle.” Sariatu repeated dully, and stared at the moon, floating over the wheat fields and the dark blob of the forest. It was late, it must have been, since usually in the early evening the moon was in the west, over the ocean.

There was a creak as Hosato knelt next to her. “I know something happened, with Kubo. The west east half of the village, it looked scorched when we came back, and Mari told everyone about what she saw. When we found you in the forest… we assumed the worst. I am afraid the elders will have questions in the morning.”

Sariatu dipped her head, politeness taking over. “Thank you, it is kind of you to warn me.” She wasn’t sure what she’d tell them. The villagers had never asked much, had always been endlessly generous and so good to Kubo, despite the magic he wielded and how obvious it must have been that she was not of their world. They deserved an explanation for why they had been caught up in the attack, and she would try to give them one that was not overly frightening.

“You should eat,” Hosato suggested. “I do not know how you lived, but you must be starving.”

As he said it, so it became true, and Sariatu felt a pang in her stomach, sharp enough to make her flinch. She nodded mutely, and Hosato gave her a kind smile before he exited, leaving her alone with the moon and a growing list of things that hurt.

Her head, her mind, her stomach, her heart. Even her bones ached with sorrow, and anger.

How dare they.

How dare they press a claim on her and her child, when she had made her choice long years ago? How dare they fill his childhood with fear, how dare they hurt him, not once but twice?

Her very soul rebelled at the idea of Kubo in that cold and heartless place, turned into a cold and heartless person. Her stomach twisted at the notion that he was lost forever- or perhaps that was just the hunger rearing, like a monster from the depths. She wanted to save him, to wage war on the heavens themselves to bring him back.

Could she?

She had seen humanity, even though she was once the best and brightest in the skies. She had learned, and loved, and come down to earth. Kubo was human, had a human heart and a human mind, surely it would not be hard for him to relearn whatever had been stolen from him. In her eternity, she had learned to never think in absolutes. There was no such thing as true death or loss, something always stayed, no matter how changed it was.

Her child lived, she knew that. Surely, she could rescue him.

It would not be easy. She knew that. But Father had always been worried about humans gaining enough power to challenge the gods. She thought she could recall…. no. The memory eluded her. But she was certain there were times when even the heavens had trembled, even if she could not form a clear recollection of them.

Hanzo. His quest for the armour had worried father, and he was a but a human. A daughter of heaven, with the Sword and the Helmet and the…. Breastplate? (She thought it was a breastplate, it was so hard to think back) stood a chance. _She_ stood a chance.

Hosato had a bowl of thin wheat noodles in his hand when he came back in, and an apologetic smile on his face. “I am sorry, it is cold, but it is the best I can do at this hour. Please, eat up.”

Sariatu finds her appetite has fled, but she picks at the bowl anyways, not wanting to offend such a gracious host. Hospitality was something humans took- take- seriously. “You are very kind,” she says, respectfully.

He shakes (shook) his head. “It’s nothing. I confess, I think without your son there, Mari could have been seriously injured. It is the least I can do.”

Without Kubo there, she never would have been in danger, Sariatu thinks guiltily, and half out of guilt she blurts, “I’m going to go to the moon and get him back.” As if that would- will- somehow reassure him.

To his credit, Hosato does not look shocked for long, polite concern quickly reinstates control over his features. “You should eat first,” he says, agreeably, “you’ll need your strength.”

Sariatu can’t argue with that.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annotations: -The title is from Shakespeare, like the previous one. Shakespeare has lots of good quotes slamming the moon. The series title is from the Tale of Genji.  
> \- The Sisters' names come from deleted scenes, which I'm taking as semi-canon material. I actually named them before the deleted scenes got released, and while I decided to go with the deleted names the ones I came up with might get used later as alternate names.  
> -Yes, I know the tense changes in Sariatu's sections are a mess. It's supposed to be a stylistic choice to represent her lack of temporal togetherness and it's awkward but I'm standing by it.  
> \- The Court of The Moon is based on a lot of eras, mostly Heian and Muromachi (since I'm mostly using very late Muromachi for the earth settings.)  
> \- The food Kubo eats is based on traditional autumn harvest festival foods, especially those eaten at moon watching events.   
> -I'm a little sketchy on directions because the orientation of the sun and moon in relation to the village varies wildly.   
> -I'm trying to keep a certain amount of Fantasy Denial, but for the record the village is based on western Kyushu, on the coast of the Korean Sea. (Because in the movie the villagers dance is based on one from the Fukuoka Prefecture.)  
> -I really need to take another editing whirl at this, but it will be another day.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted to do a Halloween update, so here it is! (Even though my writing schedule technically doesn't allow it) Annotations are at the bottom, as always. Much love to commentors, you're all the best.

A soft step and a whisper like pitch black night interrupted the music in its second hour, just when Kubo’s fingers were beginning to tire. 

“Father?” said someone with high voice that resonated, making even the softest word ring clear.    


“Aunty!” Kubo lept to his feet and ran headlong towards the doorway, pulling himself up just when he could feel the cold that emanated off his aunt, so his collision with her was more of a gentle thud than a full on crash. The cool metal of her breastplate pressed against his cheek as he gave her a cautious hug.

She didn’t hug him back, but she didn’t squirm away from his embrace either. The soft feathers of her cloak ruffled under his fingers, it was like hugging a bird in armour. 

“Are you ready for a sword lesson?”

“Yes, aunty.”

“Aunty…..?”

Kubo took in the scent of fallen leaves, incense, and chalky feathers with just a whiff of smoke, noted the way she did not shy from his touch. The fact that he couldn’t feel sword hilts at her waist was the hint that gave away an already won game. 

“Aunty Karasu,” he said firmly.

She gave his head an awkward pat and Kubo glowed. Karasu was the only member of his new family who did not dismiss the idea of physical contact on mere principal, though he got the sense she was humouring him most of the time. She was quick to anger, Karasu, but she was also generous in her praise and gentle, when the mood struck her. 

(Kubo got the sense that she had been the baby of the family, before he had come along and out-babied everyone.)

“Endah,” Grandfather said, in a low clear voice that still managed to quiet them. The twins had such apt nicknames, they were almost never called anything else, except by Grandfather. “Your sister waits in the courtyard?”

“Of course, father.”

Grandfather’s words were terse, and commanding, and Kubo could not help but notice the hint of nervous tension in her frame. “Do not disappoint me.”

“Never, father,” she said fervently, and extricated herself from Kubo’s arms with quick, efficient movements that jarred his arms in their sockets. The cold hand she put on his shoulder was too tight for comfort, and Kubo had to twist in her grip for several seconds before it loosened. 

“The same goes for you, grandson. I have the highest faith you will excel under your aunts’ tutelage.”

“I-I will try, grandfather.” Kubo promised. 

Grandfather clicked his tongue, dissatisfaction clear even before he spoke. “Do not try. Simply accomplish.”

“I’ll try! I mean, I won’t try. Really.” Kubo winced a little at his own tirade, and Karasu was kind enough to take that as her cue to bow and start walking backwards toward the door. Kubo was happy to follow her. Music with Grandfather was nice. Talking with Grandfather, less so. 

She towed him along without taking much notice of whether he could keep up, and Kubo found himself tripping down the halls alongside her. Whispering courtiers hushed as they passed, the susurration of the stars muted by the passing of a shadow. 

When they finally reached their destination she slowed, and the scent of heavy smoke hit Kubo like a wave. Yukami did not usually bother with greetings, but it was easy to tell she when she was there. 

“Sandals.” Karasu snapped as Kubo moved to step down into the gravel courtyard. 

“If you want me to find them in this century, you should just give them to me,” Kubo reminded her, “Remember? Eyes? Pulled out?”

“You are an insolent child,” Karasu- he thought- said from behind him, but she dropped the sandals in his waiting hands anyways and Kubo slipped them on with a muttered thank you. 

“Can I take my jacket and cloak off?” Kubo asked. He already knew the answer, but it was a part of their ritual to ask. 

Rituals, he had learned, made them all happier- made it feel like he was actually a part of their family rather than a strange and foreign interloper. It also gave him an excuse to be impolite in ways that would never slide otherwise, on the basis that he was simply repeating past impertinence. 

There was a hint of a smile turning up the sharp edges of Yukami’s otherwise thorny words, exposing the less threatening underbelly. “You can take off your suikan, yes. Your cloak, you know you must keep, little nephew.”

Kubo was so glad to be rid of the heavy overrobe with its cumbersome sleeves, he could tolerate being saddled with the half cape of soft feathers-cut small especially for him- in return. In a way it made he and his aunts match, and he could imagine his mother wearing something similar, long ago in her past. 

“Now, your sword,” Yukami ordered, less kindly. Kubo drew the long blade and held it ready in the stance his mother had taught him so long ago. The difference was, she had tutored him with sticks and play fights around their banked fire. His aunts had a more… straightforward teaching method.  

Yukami moved past him, the swish of her cloak making air swirl, kicking up eddies of dry smelling dust and disturbing the smoke that surrounded them. Kubo resisted the urge to turn his head and follow her, instead focusing on staying alert and keeping his stance wide and low, ready to dodge.

When she swept out of nowhere, one sword trapping his, the other sliding up to tickle his chin, he wasn’t anywhere near prepared. She didn’t even bother with a scolding, simply drawing back to let him try again. 

And again, and again. 

Sweat started to bead on Kubo’s forehead, the frigid air cooling it to make him uncomfortably clammy. No matter how he tried, he couldn’t anticipate Yukami’s movements. Even if he had some idea where she was, he couldn’t block her. She moved too fast and too unpredictably and she  _ floated _ . 

A piece of gravel hit his arm, and he heard Karasu’s high, silvery laugh, followed by another pebble. 

Sometimes, he did not appreciate her sense of humour. 

Yukami was somewhere behind him, her breathing shallow and her cape fluttering in the air. Karasu was to his left, throwing the occasional stone and generally enjoying herself to an unnecessary extent. 

He dug his feet into the ground and squared his shoulders. If he couldn’t dodge he could at least try to block her. It might even stop Karasu from tittering, though he wasn’t optimistic. 

The next strike whistled as it came down towards the back of his head. Kubo tried to twist and bring his blade up to parry, but overbalanced and pinwheeled wildly before hitting the ground with a thud. Yukami was on him instantly, setting him on his feet and returning his sword to his hand, then knocking him gently about his head. 

“A warrior on the ground is even worse than a warrior standing and dying. Foolishness brings more dishonour than incapability. Weeks we have taught you, and still, you learn nothing.”

Kubo’s palms smarted from the impact and his cheeks were hot with embarrassment. “Perhaps, Aunty,” he said cautiously, “You just aren’t a very good teacher.”

That was an understatement. She gave no advice or instruction, no allowance for his smaller frame and deficiencies in the flying department. She just attacked him and expected him to somehow magically develop the skills to block her. If not for his mother’s brief lessons he wouldn’t even know how to hold a sword right. Karasu was slightly better when it came to giving directions and critiques, but she also grossly overestimated his abilities, leading to several instances where Yukami had to interfere and remind her sister how tragically breakable human children were. 

Yukami bristled at the accusation, her feathers rustling. “You should learn respect for your elders, nephew. How am I meant to teach a helpless infant, too small and weak to even protect his own life?” As if to demonstrate she leaned in and pressed one sword blade to the back of Kubo’s neck. He was unperturbed, Grandfather wouldn’t be happy if she killed him. 

“Possibly try talking to me? And taking things slow instead of trouncing me a few dozen times a minute? That _ might _ help.” 

“I fail to see how enabling your frailty will solve it,” she said in a gelid murmur. 

Kubo gestured wildly, one hand hitting his aunt’s mailed forearm, “Because humans don’t learn things all at once! They have to learn little bits at a time! It took me years to get good at paper folding, I practiced music every day from the ages of three to five before anyone other than my mother wanted to hear me!” He flung his arms out demonstrate his point, and realized numbly when a line of heat and pain sliced across his arm that he may have miscalculated, given the swords in the general vicinity. 

The blade still pressed against the base of his skull apparently extended further to the side than he had expected, far enough for the edge to gash open his arm, send hot blood trickling down the sleeve of his kosode. 

Yukami, to her credit, instantly drew the blade back as Kubo pulled his arm in, instinct and shock taking over. The pain hadn’t quite appeared yet, but he could sense it lurking at the edge of his mind, ready for its showstopper performance. 

“Your arm…” he couldn’t tell which of the two it was, they were both standing over him now. Colds hands were tugging at his arm, trying to pull it out so they could inspect it, but Kubo kept it stubbornly clutched to his side. Blood was seeping through the fingers wrapped tightly around the wound, and pulling the fine linen of his underrobe over it wasn’t doing much to staunch the flow.  

“It’s bleeding,” he said around his heavy tongue. He was already feeling woozy, which did dull the pulling pain spasming across the inside of his upper arm. “Something humans do. I need to tie it up- bandage it. A rag, or something. That’s what the- the….” he trailed off as his memories did. 

The smell of blood was thick in the air. Someone- Karasu?- shoved the heavy silk weight of his jacket into his hands and he twisted it around his arm, putting pressure on the cut. He hoped it wasn’t deep, luckily the pain was already fading.

His aunts were fussing over his head, genuine worry in their voices. For all their brushes with danger and questionable teaching methods, they’d always managed to avoid doing him any actual harm- the eyeball incident nonwithstanding

One of them was still yanking at his elbow, trying to get him to relinquish control of his arm. Kubo reluctantly let them pull it straight and inspect the wound. There was the sound of tearing silk, and a pressure wrapping around his bicep, securely bandaging it. 

It was a little too tight, and Kubo tugged on the neat cross knot holding it together. One of the Sisters slapped his hand away.

“Don’t touch that.” They snapped at the same time, already eerie echoing voices layering on top of one another, folding and refolding until they seemed to speak with the voice of thousands.

Kubo persevered, unwound the makeshift bandage and clumsily rewrapped it so he could feel his fingers, holding the end in his teeth so he could tie it, twice knotting it to make sure the silk did not slip. 

“You did it wrong.” he complained. 

“I doubt your silly humans did any better.” Yukami said dismissively, “You must learn better than to injure yourself, especially if you’re going to leak fluids all over the place.    
  
He froze. 

“There were humans then? I lived with them?” 

He’d known it for some time, there was no other explanation for the holes and dead spaces in his memory, but getting actual confirmation, unprompted and honest, was more than he had hoped. They had existed, he had known them and probably loved them as well, it wasn’t just his mind playing tricks on him. 

“Does it matter?”

“Of course it does!” Hysteria was creeping into his voice. “I can’t remember and no one will tell me. There are bits and pieces, but they fade in and out. I’m missing parts of myself, parts of my past, I can’t put together my own story, and you act like it’s fine! But it’s not, because there is this pressure on my chest, letting me know that I’ve forgotten something I can never remember and I hate it. I can’t remember who I am.” 

Tears were soaking through the cloth wrapped around his empty eye sockets. It was kind of his grandfather and Yukami to leave him his tear ducts. It meant he could get properly sniffly. 

“You are our nephew,” said one of them. 

“You are your grandfather’s descendant,” the other added, more angrily. “Your mother’s son. A child of divinity. So much more than the mud and filth you grew up surrounded by. Why should it matter what you thought you were. You’re home now. Stop being ridiculous.”

“No!” Kubo shouted, hot tears finding a way under the blindfold to his cheeks. He could taste salt, and feel the goopy, stuffed up helplessness of a full fledged sobbing fit coming on. “I won’t. It matters. I lived there, I had a life and you took it away from me, and then you took my memories too, but I still know the place where they were. I know what I ate as a child, but I can’t remember where we got it. I know the games I played but not who I played them with. I can remember mother, and that she told me stories, but I can’t remember the stories themselves. I want to know, but you won’t even let me talk about my life before. Why?”

“Because you are vulnerable.” Yukami told him. “Those stories, those memories. They’d twist your mind and distract you from the truth, as they distracted your mother.”

“We loved our sister,” Karasu said, and she said it like a prayer. “And the human world stole her heart, stole her soul, stole her life.”

Kubo cringed. It always hurt to be reminded of the grief that still lurked around every corner, and the fact that he was a living reminder of his mother’s fall from grace. It felt too much like being hated, when he had worked so hard to earn the tolerance of his kinsmen. But it hurt to have a million blank spaces in his mind as well. Like a missing tooth he couldn’t stop poking at, or an image in the corner of his eyes he couldn’t quite see. It was maddening and he suspected that if he let it, it would drive him mad. He _ needed  _ answers like he needed air, and now, emboldened by pain and frustration, was as good a time as any to get them. 

“It hurts. I can’t remember and it hurts, and I can’t- I’ve tried not to talk about it because you don’t want to talk about it, but I still know. You need to tell me. I need a story to have.” Kubo had his arms crossed against his chest again, putting comforting weight on his stinging cut. It made him feel ready for an attack, which was what he half expected. 

Karasu’s impatience was palapable. “You were born, you lived a life of little note, you came here. That is your story,  _ we  _ are your story.”

“That’s not how it works!” Kubo argued, squaring his shoulders, trying to make himself feel bigger, not small and attacked. “My father, my mother, they’re still a part of me. I can’t just ignore them!”

“ _ Try. _ ” Karasu hissed, viciously. “I have seen long centuries, and let me tell you. Everything human fades. All part of your meagre, miserable planet rots and dies. Your memories will fade, they should have already. Your idiotic human resistance to the way of the world will wither. And I cannot wait until it does. I am tired of playing nursemaid to a squalling, inconsiderate, ungrateful babe. I am sick of my sister’s legacy being a half human brat without the sense or manners to go a single hour without throwing his regrettable origins in our face.” 

She whirled, her cape flaring out behind her in a swish of sound and air, and stormed off. Kubo glared in the direction of her exit, and felt a flare of determination. I won’t, he promised himself. I won’t forget anymore, and I’ll find the memories you took. 

Yukami made a soft sound of disappointment. “If you were not already injured, nephew,” she said conversationally, “I would smack you for upsetting your aunty so. Must you always push the subject of your past?”

Kubo pressed his lips together, biting back sarcastic comments and stubborn demands. He had spent most of the past month carefully avoiding his past, walking on tiptoes around any insinuation that he had been anything before his aunts had whisked him away. He wasn’t sure how much more subtle he was supposed to be. The fact of the matter was that he had a past, he couldn’t remember it, and it was upsetting on an instinctive level. Confusion could make anyone irate, and his family’s utter refusal to even address the subject made things worse. 

He was tired. Tired of being lost, tired of not knowing where to put himself in the world that played out around him, tired of being silenced and contradicted and talked down to. 

Yukami brushed a bit of hair away from his forehead, pressed a thumb to his tear stained cheek. “Don’t sulk, or I’ll tell Grandfather.” she threatened, a weighty ultimatum. Kubo wasn’t sure what a man who thought stealing a child’s eyes was a good strategy for family harmony would make of discipline. He didn’t really want to find out. “You’ve ruined your entire outfit. Must humans leak fluid everywhere?”

“We can’t really help it when there are swords involved.” Kubo said sullenly. 

“Be more careful next time then.”

“Or maybe stop putting sharp blades around me,” Kubo suggested, without much hope his suggestion would be taken seriously. 

Sure enough, Yukami laughed, short and mirthless. “Then how will you learn?” she asked sincerely. 

Kubo couldn’t even argue with her thought process. He knew something wasn’t right about it, but he couldn’t put it into words, or even pin down what was wrong. It just didn’t feel like the sort of thing people were supposed to say. 

“Your cloak is clean,” she noted, and Kubo started to take it off so he couldn’t ruin it. He wasn’t sure how feathers washed, but he suspected they didn’t do it well. 

Yukami stopped him. “Remember, you must never take this off. I won’t have you forming bad habits on my watch.” She grabbed Kubo’s good hand with lightning quickness. Padlike calluses- the only concession to a warrior’s lifestyle on her delicate, sharp nailed hands- and a strong grip held him firm. “Let’s get you into new clothes, before grandfather sees.” she said, more an order than a suggestion. “And have someone more versed in human weakness take a look at your arm.” 

Kubo hated the idea of being dressed up like a doll again, standing still as attendants tied him into layers of fine clothing and talked over his head about colour combinations and the minutiae of clothing etiquette. Once every few days was enough. But there was a quality about Yukami’s voice that reminded him of a file, sharp and about to break into lethal fragments. 

Maybe he’d pushed enough for one day. 

He followed her docilely up the step into the covered halls of the palace, but slipped his hand out of hers as soon as he had a chance.

He could find his own way. He had to. 

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


The sunrise does not do anything for Sariatu’s concentration. She’s not catatonic, which is a marked improvement over the last five years, but it’s close. Hosato keeps a firm grip on her arm as they make their way out of the house and down the road to the tiny village shrine. 

She can see the damage her sisters wrought, even through the late morning glare. All the houses on the east end of the village are charred and black, some walls collapsed and some roofs left dangerously unsupported. The only people there are the men and women who labour at repairs, hoisting beams to replace damaged ones, weaving flat mats of reeds for the walls, and mixing the mud and clay to cover them. It is reassuring to see that life moved apace despite the meddling of heaven. 

Hosato leads her gently, over to the tall house with a bell outside, one that she vaguely recognized. It did not quite have the look of a temple, but for a small village, it probably sufficed. A crowd of villagers, elders and family heads alike, is gathered around the door, staring at her with unabashed curiosity and surprise. 

“You’re awake,” one of the more venerable grandmother’s says happily. “Praise be!”

There are murmurs of agreement. Sariatu tried to pull her face into a good natured smile, but her muscles wouldn’t cooperate and she gave up. 

“Why don’t we go inside,” Hosato suggests. “Our neighbor is still recovering from her ordeal, and I think that there is much to discuss?”

“Yes, yes!” a burly man in brilliant blue shouts, more excited than threatening, “We must hear the story!”

“Such happenings,” mutters a grandfather. 

“That poor boy,” says someone in the back of the crowd, loud enough for Sariatu’s stomach to clench. 

An older woman grabs her hand on the way in, and says kindly, “We’re so glad you woke up. ” Sariatu pulls away instinctively, startled, and regrets the rudeness instantly. By then the woman has disappeared, sucked into the throng. 

The crowd is a creature unto itself, loud and moving, a shifting sea of familiar, unnameable faces and whispers as everyone slowly files into the temple-meeting house. The dark shadows are a relief after the bright sunshine, as is the sense of quietude in the not quite temple. Sariatu’s eyes adjust slowly and she makes out a wide open room, the villagers staring. A screen in the back hides something from view, but in front of it is a little dais, a carved wooden statue, a simple bowl for alms and… her shamisen. 

It lays in front of the statue like an offering, Kubo’s pack spread out next to it. Arrayed with ritual neatness on the cloth are sheets of origami paper, a few coins, and a little figurine of a monkey, staring determinedly into the distance. Sariatu is kneeling next to it before she can think. 

The stacked paper is a little the worse for wear, the shamisen needs a new string, but they are there, solid and well known. She brushes the woodwork of the shamisen, trying to remember Kubo’s face and laugh. They do not come easily, but eventually they slide into place, his smile, his eyes (eye). Sariatu rolls Mr. Monkey from palm to palm, and wants to weep. 

“We didn’t know what to with these.” a creaking voice says apologetically, from somewhere behind her shoulder. “You wouldn’t wake up, so we left them here. We thought- I don’t know.”

Sariatu looks at the display again and sees it for what it is, a funerary display for a lost child with no family grave to bear witness to him, no body to wash and arrange, a mystery but a loved one.  

“Thank you,” she says, “But might I have them back? I think I will need them.”    
  
The shamisen is a powerful weapon, even in her hands. She has never been as creative at paper folding as Kubo, but she knows how to make the tokens of good luck and little purification spells of the old days. And the monkey… charms were powerful things and she had always been good with them. Bringing life and power to the inanimate is what her family excels at- she and her sisters are testimony to that. 

The old lady glances at a threadbare monk, and the monk shrugs, so Sariatu drops the coins in the offering bowl and pulls the rest of the bundle into her lap, slings the shamisen across her back, and hides the little monkey in her sleeve, where it makes reassuring weight. 

Hosato sits next to her and smiles reassuringly, an old lady without teeth in patched clothing who Sariatu thinks may have talked to her within the last five minutes sits on the other side, and the meeting is called to order. 

Slowly. 

The townsfolk are not easy to get in line, and no one actually seems to be in charge. Eventually the floor is taken over by a wizened old man with a steady cough, who seems to be respected mostly on the merit of being the oldest person there (Sariatu excluded.)

“Our village has been scourged by an angry spirit,” he starts, “And I’m sure everyone is wondering what happened. This is most unprecedented. An innocent child, stolen, houses and livelihoods destroyed.” Sariatu steels herself for the oncoming ordeal, and tries to remember the best ways to explain the ways of the gods to humans. “We are all worried about the future if we cannot calm these vengeful powers. Fortunately a woman who saw them, our….” the old man chews thoughtfully on his words before saying, “Mmmhmm, story teller’s mother, saw them and lived. Hosato says she knows of their grievance.”

Her turn to take the stage. Sariatu fusses with the paper in her lap and tries not to make direct eye contact with anyone, and also not start a mass panic. Though they are good hearted as ever, there is a note of tredipidatation in the room, fear of what the future and the gods might brings. 

“You do not need to worry, they were not here for you.” she says, twisting the fine sheets between her fingers, making folds and then smoothing them back out. “I am afraid they are my sisters, and they were looking for Kubo.”

She tells them everything, as quickly and smoothly as she can. Her birthright, her family, her betrayal. Kubo’s birth, her father’s rage, her sisters resentment. The flight, the precautions she took to keep Kubo safe, their eventual and inevitable failure. 

There are no exclamations of outrage, no outrage at all. There is puzzlement when she explains Kubo’s predicament, stolen from the human world by his jealous relatives, and relief as well. 

“He’s not dead?” they say, many voices all with the same sentiment. 

“No. They-they wish to change him, make him like them, but there is still time. He is a child, they cannot twist what they cannot understand, I hope.” she lifts her chin. “I am going to save him. But I understand if you would like me to leave, I will not bring more danger upon your heads.”

The old lady- in her patched robes and simple bun-  _ laughs _ . 

“You might not remember, but I was there when they first brought you back up from the beach, missy. A strange lady washes up with the tide wearing yards of silk, she’s either a goddess or runaway nobility. It didn’t matter then, and I don’t think it matters now,” she pats Sariatu’s hand again, the motion bringing with it a heavy sense of deja vu. “Just try to stay in at night, deary, and I think we’ll all be fine.”

There are reluctant nods, and few cries of agreement that make Sariatu’s head spin. 

“That’s right, Auntie,”   
  
“You saved my husband from a storm, it’s the least we could do,”

“Go give them what for!”

Eventually the hubbub dies down, petering out with a mutter from the back of, “I always thought she was a goddess. Goddesses like caves, that’s a well known fact.” Sariatu is aware she should be grateful, but instead she’s just tired. Hokuto- no, that’s not right- Hosato, is staring at her hands, still fiddling with the now very folded paper. She glances down and is surprised to find a little figure in her hands, in intricate armour and a helmet that stirs something in the depths of her memory. 

She frowns. 

“I don’t know who this is.” she whispers, mostly to herself. 

“That’s Hanzo!” someone in the crowd says. There is a happy rush of noise. The old lady grins toothlessly. 

“Hero of heroes, slayer of monsters, nemesis of the Moon King and chickens everywhere. Your son, he always told everyone stories about him. I suppose, if the Moon King is your father, Hanzo is real as well?” She seems more excited than frightened by the prospect of such tales being true. It must look rather exciting from the outside, all the adventures and enchantment. 

“He was my husband.” Sariatu says, and brings the figurine up to eye level. The stoic little samurai is not the man she married, but it is undeniably Kubo’s style. She tries to memorize the creases and angles, a futile effort but a worthwhile one. Then she places the figure next to the tall statue on the dais, next to the flowers and candles. The village deserves some tribute, however small. 

She turns back and tunes back in just in time to catch the end of some joke about husbands and in-laws, and folds her hands neatly in her lap. 

A matron with a baby tied to her chest pipes up, “So, they won’t come back?”

“I do not think so.” Sariatu says, “My sister left me alive, and unless they learn of my efforts to bring Kubo home, I do not expect any visits.” She does not mention Yukami’s curse, the elixir, her injury and her healing. Some things are best left unspoken. 

That seems to soothe them. “How are you going to rescue him?” another voice asks, and there is curiosity and excitement there. The nobility of an epic quest for a lost child is not easy to ignore. 

“There is armour-” Sariatu begins, and there are sighs from the crowd, a rustle of words unintelligible. Sariatu backtracks, befuddled. 

Hosato leans over to whisper, “Your son, he told stories about them. The Sword Unbreakable, the Breast Plate Impenetrable, the Helmet Invulnerable.” There is a note of wistfulness even to his words. If the flock of villagers had come to hear about ghosts and danger, they’re staying to hear a story. 

Sariatu might not be able to weave thread, but she can spin a yarn like a master historian, provided she remembers how the story goes. She straightens her back and speaks from her stomach, the throwing voice of a storyteller. 

“Though they are hidden far, far away, with their power, perhaps my son can be rescued. It will not be easy, however. I may need some time to recover.”

She doesn’t want to be a burden, and she hopes she can find the energy to help during her stay. There is so much to do, it’s dizzying. 

Fortunately, the inhabitants of the Sun Village seem to be on board. 

“We’ll help!”    
  
“As much as we can,” a moderating influence adds, but even that is swept away in the tide of elation. The press of the congregation is stifling. 

A white haired woman scoots across the floor closer to Sariatu,  who tries not to reel back. 

“All those years, waiting for Kubo to end his stories, and here’s the story now, for us to end on our own,” she says with a tight smile, “It’s very exciting. Now I know Hosato offered to take care of you while you were ill, but now that you’re awake, would you like to stay somewhere else? Not that you’re not lovely, dear,” she adds to Hosato, “But she is a goddess. It seems more proper to have her stay somewhere with more women about.”

It takes Sariatu a second to realize what is being said. Busybodies- older folk well past the age of minding their own business- have been gently haranguing her and Kubo for years. The well intentioned fussiness is almost charming. 

Hosato looks torn between being slightly offended and amused. “I’m don’t think you have you have a spare room, auntie. But I will not fight you on this.”

“I’m a widow and a mother,” Sariatu says, a little more loudly than she had intended. “Not a maiden hidden behind a screen. If it is fine with the potter, I would prefer to stay with him.” 

He nods in agreement and the woman on Sariatu’s left laughs. More people are pushing in, and her sense of disorientation increases. She can only focus on so many things at once. 

“You shouldn’t go alone,” one person says. “I’m sure we could find some young man to accompany you.”

“They’re all busy. It is harvest time soon.”   


“What about Ishi? She’s a strong girl, very muscular.”   
  
“I don’t need-” Sariatu tries to cut in, but was drowned out by a sea of suggestions and complaints. 

“My nephew could-”

“That boy couldn’t find his own head and it’s attached to his shoulders.”

“Kuriami has always been a religious sort…”

“Please, I really don’t think-”

“Pssh!”   
  
The largest man in the group, a solidly built, well mustached gentleman with a shaved pate, lurches to his feet and declares in a voice like thunder, “I will go along on the quest!”

There is a second of silence, then: “Not with your sister about to give birth, you won’t!” 

The guffaws of laughter give Sariatu time to collect herself, Kubo’s bundle, the shamisen and rise shakily to her feet. Her train, folded inelegantly under her, almost trips her up. It is not a graceful ascent, and she must concede the point, she’s not in any position to travel alone.    
  
That doesn’t mean she’s dragging some farmer’s child into a war of the heavens. 

“Your offers of help are much appreciated,” she says, a little breathily. “But I think I can find my own companion.”   
  
Mr. Monkey is already safely hidden in her sleeve, a failed talisman ready to be given one last chance. 

The horde follows her out into the street, and even more people join them as Sariatu makes her way to the middle of the road. The sun beats down, but she has vitality aplenty, if not necessarily the mental acuity to back it up. Her skirts drag in the dust, but they were ruined long ago. The crush of her audience is a little more challenging to deal with, but they leave a wide space in the center for her to work with, enough, she hopes. 

Starlight does not come easily to her palms anymore, and the sun almost blots it from view. Sariatu edges into the nearby shadow of a house and persists. When the glow of distant solar fires is finally visible, tendrils of light snaking up her arms, she lets the statuette drop into her waiting hands, concentrates on memories of long lost vigor and acuity, and throws the resulting meteor of light and wood to the ground.

Then, she stumbled (stumbles) into a wall. 

When she finally blinks the spots of colour from her eyes, and stops hearing her heart pounding in her ears, there are hands hovering around her. Hosato looks woozy, possibly out of sheer sympathy, possibly from shock. There is a breathless hush from all corners. 

She claws her way to full uprightness again, and staggers forward, the crowd parting in front of her. 

And there is a monkey. 

Huge, white furred, excessively fanged, staring at her with serious brown eyes. 

_ Still got it.  _

She can’t remember the walk home, the collapse onto her borrowed sleeping mat, but that’s okay. She suspects in the later twilight, that the monkey tucked her in. 

  
  
  
  
  
  
  


Kubo had quickly grown to despise the pomp and protocol of rituals. They were interminable, tedious, and required sitting still for frankly criminal amounts of time. 

There was only so long he could entertain himself listening to courtly whispers, the click of fans, and yards of silk dragging on the floor- and it wasn’t very long at all. The hall smelled sickeningly of perfume, his legs often fell asleep, and grandfather made tiny disapproving sounds if he fidgeted. 

They were having dances today, which should have been interesting but somehow managed to get bogged down by the interminable, bloated formality of the gods. The shrill flutes shrieked steadily and sonorous drums beat slowly, accompanied by lots of non shamisen instruments, the clash of bells, and the swish of robes moving in measured steps, every one with centuries of history behind it. 

The dances got faster as they went along, but in the meantime, Kubo was bored out of his skull.  

Karasu and Yukami were on grandfather’s other side today, and Karasu was still ignoring him, which ruled out the usual games of making faces until one of them prodded him. He’d given up on following the cracks in the floorboards, since there didn’t seem to be any- the floor was just one smooth surface of grained wood. Holding his breath was a last resort and even that had gotten dull a few minutes in. 

The drums picked up a little, and Kubo shifted his weight, so he was resting on the backs on his feet rather than his knees. He leaned back and balanced, first using his hands to steady himself, then without them. If there was one good thing about wearing enough his own body weight in clothing, it was that he was shrouded from view, hidden in his tent of silk. Layers of clothing muted movement- to the point that he was figuring out the logistics of sneaking pebbles into the great hall and playing Throwing and Catching in his sleeve. 

His back started to hurt from the effort of keeping himself steady, and Kubo let his knees rest back on the floor for a second before pushing himself back up. If he leaned back far enough and turned his legs out  he could almost balance on his toes, and the exertion was a nice distraction from the steady chime and thud of the instruments on the stage. 

He folded his arms behind him to move his weight even farther back, as the music began to pick up. So captivated was he in his quest, that the sudden blare of the mouth organs caught him entirely off guard. He started, and toppled backwards, hitting the ground with a thud that rung through the room.

Under the circumstances, he thought his best option was to not get up. 

There was a loud and clanging stop to the music, tasteful giggles muffled by fans, and one of his aunts’ clear voices above it all, beautiful and distant as a temple bell. 

“I think he’s broken, how sad.”

There was another round of fearful titters, and Kubo tried to suppress a grin. Grandfather did not sound happy as he said, “Karyani, Endah, please remove him from here.” There were footsteps above him and Kubo found himself swept into thin, strong, well mailed arms. The smell of musky incense and autumn leaves enveloped him, and he realized it was Karasu who had picked him up and was leaving with him, one set of footsteps on the floor. 

She held him like a sack of moldy apples, a few inches away from her body and with no thought given to comfort or structure. His head was going to bruise, and his arms felt weird, but he tried to stay limp. 

A few minutes out from the hall, when the music had quieted, Karasu stopped. 

“I know you are there. Must you be foolish?”   


Kubo gave up the gambit and sat up, hands grabbing at Karasu’s cloak so he didn’t feel quite so suspended in mid air. “I wasn’t trying to do it!” he protested, “Well, a little bit. I just got bored so I was balancing and then I fell and then I just didn’t… get up.”

“And what exactly did that accomplish?”   


Kubo felt a sly grin sneaking onto his face, entirely of its own accord. “I’m not in there anymore, am I?”

“You are a terribly raised child,” Karasu said sweetly, which stung but Kubo had mostly resigned himself to the fact that making cruel comments was just what his aunts did. They didn’t seem to have any other communication strategies.

She hadn’t put him down yet, which was something. 

“I think all children are like me.” Kubo said, hesitantly. He didn’t want to make any claims he couldn’t back up, but he had a feeling he was right. Besides, he refused to think that his mother had been an incompetent caretaker. 

“Is your arm still injured?” she asked, brusquely. 

Kubo flexed the limb experimentally. It protested, pain shooting up to his shoulder. “Yes, aunty. It’ll take a while to heal, but I think it’s not too bad. Just a scratch.” 

Karasu dropped him. 

Kubo braced for impact, but hit a surprisingly soft, lumpy surface instead of unforgiving wood. A second of exploration revealed he had been deposited in his nest of robes, familiar embroidery patterns and piles of tangled textiles. 

Even more surprising was that Karasu dropped down next to him, grabbed his hand, and placed something light and sharp edged in it, something that wriggled despite being too frail to be truly alive. 

_Yori_. 

Kubo let the little samurai climb onto his shoulder and hide behind his hair. He tried to look sheepish. 

“I needed someone to wake me up,”

Karasu didn’t respond, but he could practically taste her disapproval. 

“I’m really sorry if I upset you earlier.” Kubo said, his shoulders hunching. “It’s just really strange. Coming here, and not being able to remember half of my life… Not being able to remember who I really am.”

“So make yourself anew,” Karasu said, like it was the simplest thing in the world. “Become one of us. That is why we did it, to make it easier for you. It is our policy when one of our number becomes too tainted by mortality.” She brushed a hand down his back, down the tiny fledgling feathers of his cloak. Kubo shivered and tried to hold onto his earlier resolution. He would not give up, he would figure it all out. 

“I just-” he tried to put his feelings into words that Karasu would understand, an impossible task when he barely understood them himself. His throat tightened. “I just- I really miss my mom.”

There was almost sympathy in Karasu’s voice as she replied; “And I miss my sister. But oh, little nephew,” her voice dropped into a whisper. Cold fingers skimmed his jawline. 

“Kubo, you know your mother is dead.”

  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> \- Kubo wears a suikan robe from the Heian-ish period, and the idea of a feather cloak is drawn from the Sister's designs, stories about tennin in Buddhist folklore, and the Tale of The Bamboo Cutter where it is sometimes mentioned that the heavenly being Princess Kaguya puts on a feathered robe to forget about the earth. Obviously it isn't quite as effective on Kubo, since he is of the mortal realm himself, but his aunts are still eager to keep it on him  
> \- The villagers are essentially autonomous in canon, and here they are as well. I suspect they might technically fall under the purview of a monastary or something, but they do their own things.   
> \- Again, I'm trying to stick with Fantasy rather than a straight up interpretation of Shinto canon, but I still couldn't resisit dropping an Amaterasu joke in there. Gosh darn godesses, living in caves all the time.   
> \- The Moon Court draws a lot from Shinto tradition and ancient imperial Japan but not too much, the idea being that it is a rareified, frozen version of the world below, with all the good stuff dulled down and all the emotion take out. In here they're putting on a display of gagaku ritual dancing with some elements of older kagura dances, but it's not nearly as nice as the real thing because it's so formalized and stiff. (Also, Kubo is blind so the dancing loses something, but it's mostly the lack of emotion.)


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey! Thank you for all the comments, they're very much appreciated. Writing is slow, and the plot is slower but rest assured this will keep moving in little bits. Annotations at the bottom, as always. Also, I have a writing blog now at herenortherenearnorfar.tumblr.com, so if you want another place for updates and so forth, that's the place.

Sariatu leaves in the morning, just as the sun rises over the horizon.

It is for the best if she wants to get a full day of travel in before moonrise, but it also means she is unresponsive during the hurried goodbyes. Half the village turns out to see her away, but she struggles to respond to half the blessings and well wishes, before Mister Monkey (Or as Sariatu had recently discovered, Miss Monkey) sweeps her away.

It had been a hard week.

She was not about to take from those who had so little to give, so she had worked to build up the supplies needed for a long trip. Little spells, to help rebuild and strengthen what was damaged, had pushed her to her limit. She had written letters, painted characters on Hosato’s wares in her best calligraphy, and generally tried to be helpful.

It had worked out, for the most part.

Kameyo, the old lady, apparently knew Kubo very well, and was happy to help. Little Mari clung to Sariatu’s skirts, giving advice and making suggestions. The local monk was more suspicious, but willing to give out a blessing or two. The giant blacksmith, the gentle farm wife, barefoot children, all happy to give a little bit of their nothing in return for a shattered story, a half forgotten song.

She knows where she is going, almost. Long talks with the villagers about Kubo’s stories have revealed that the sword is almost definitely in the northern mountains.

There are a _lot_ of mountains north of them, but she’ll figure it out as she goes along.

A dawn farewell may always be drenched in dew, but it is dew alone. Sariatu does not have it in her to be sad. It is a moment of beginning, and that cannot help but be hopeful.

(Mari hugs her goodbye. The villagers shout blessings and good luck. She tries to smile until she turns into the woods. It it less than they are due.)

Her long train is tied up, and her shoes are firmly knotted on. Monkey is a soothing presence at her side, two hundred pounds of magical muscle, her power made flesh.

They heads east, towards larger towns that might have a boat to spare- or, more accurately, Monkey goes east and Sariatu follows after her.

Others might not think it auspicious to start a quest barely alert, but Sariatu can almost remember seeing Hanzo off in predawn hours, retying his armour and reminding him to fight less like an actor showing off and more like someone trying to come home.

Almost, but not quite enough.

 

 

 

She can recall their first meeting, not their second one. Not quite. There are snippets here and there that feel made up, like a dream remembered so much it masquerades as true memory.

Shadows, the rich darkness, a single candle. The weight of religion in the air, hope and prayers and pleas to the dead.

“Why are you here?”

“Waiting for you.”

The rest is in pieces.

A stolen meeting, a nighttime visit, always concealed from her father’s gaze. Secret poems left in hidden places, all their education softened by the heart racing clumsiness of new love until symbolism is muddled and form completely abandoned. 

Promises, scant touches, flowers. Scoffs and eyerolls and terrible flirtations.

There are no words. Scents, fleeting images, eyes gleaming in the shadows. Steel ringing on steel, plum blossoms, incense, whispers. Magic to protect and hide her love and lover from her family's wrath. 

Temples, shrines, tents, his bedroom. Sitting up long hours trading stories about battles, adventures, and subterfuge. Secrets of the celestial sphere divulged to a mere mortal for no reason but love.

It’s not a story, but it is hers.

 

 

The hours of daylight have always been a time of contemplation for her. The warm autumn sunlight offsets the crispness of the air, and the steady rhythm of footfalls taps a counterpoint to her human heartbeat. It is meditative, in a way. Different from summer days of silence facing the sea, or long winter afternoons in the castle of the Beetle Clan, but soothing nonetheless.

She must marshal her thoughts now more than ever, there is so much at stake.

Sariatu runs over the stories from the villagers in her mind, lingering on every detail, trying to commit them all to memory. Some seem familiar, distorted echoes of tales she must have once told her son, some seem completely new- not that that means much.

Hanzo’s stronghold, in the beautiful west, not far from the capital but well hidden from harm both magical and mundane. Snowfalls in winter, summers of splendour. Red leaves falling from trees.

The icy north, bare and dangerous. Mountains striking and riddled with caves. North of the village, yes, obviously. North of Hanzo? She thinks so.

(It’s so hard to think.)

Mountains. They were a traditional hiding place for relics of power, and perhaps Kubo had just been imitating that. What had the villagers said?

_“Deep within the bowels of the earth, guarded by many monsters! A hero has to fight all of them to get to the secret shrine of the Sword Unbreakable! Hanzo went like this! And then he went like this and cut them all to shreds!”_

As far as instructions went it is…. less than helpful. But if she just uses her head, she can separate out some truth from it.

The armour of legends had long evaded even her father’s eyes. It was either disguised, or out of sight of even the moon. Underground is a possibility, but so is ‘ _inside_ ’ or ‘ _under a very shady tree_ ’. It doesn’t pay to make assumptions.

Guardians are a must. Any object of power has to be protected from those who might use it for evil. Spirits of the missing, elemental powers, monsters out of legend, very determined nuns, anything is possible, but there must be something there to keep it safe from the unworthy. She was once a goddess, Sariatu knows how legends work, especially with swords.

Monsters… that is a possibility. If she could just recall the stories about great monsters across the land, that might help narrow it down a little bit. If she could just recall……

(The hours fade away.)

 

 

The problem with the moon was that it was too big.

You wouldn’t have thought it, looking up from Earth, but it was. Endless hallways and gardens and poetry rooms. Kubo wandered farther every day, and he still couldn’t find an end to all of it. More often than not, he got lost.

There was so much to discover, and none of it seemed to have anything to do with his memories.

There were rooms where beautiful birds sang beautiful songs that repeated over and over again, never stopping or changing. Still gardens of trees with leaves made of crinkling foil, perfectly round lakes he could walk endless circles around, water so cold it burned, lords and ladies in robes finer than spider webs that never tore and whispered as they walked, disturbing the perfectly still air. Kubo had eavesdropped on recitations of ancient poems and songs, on concerts as lovely as they were eventually boring. He’d learned the trick of looking like he knew where he was going that kept people from bothering him, as long as he could keep it up.

The hallways were oriented at perfect right angles to each other, ending in pavilions and halls and neatly boxed off rooms. Courtyards were just as perfect, every piece of gravel shaped the same as the others, even gardens had an eerie symmetry to them. The wood floor had grain and texture, but it was too even and the wood never seemed to end or have seams except at thresholds. As useful as the predictability was when it came to not getting lost, it wasn’t very helpful for finding out secrets.

The closest Kubo had come so far was a wide courtyard full of a strange snuffling and thudding noises. There was no entrance, the smooth wooden railings went all the way around the raised walkway, and without some idea of what was inside Kubo was hesitant to climb over. He’d tried shouting, but got no response.

It was obviously important, it was near the center of everything and it was big, large enough that it took almost ten minutes to walk all the way around it. The pounding noises occasionally faltered, little breaks in the steady beat, and sometimes Kubo thought he could feel someone, or several someones, watching him.

It didn’t scream, “Earth memories hidden here!” but it was the nearest to a lead he had.

So, he sat, legs dangling off the walkway, arms resting on the lower rail, staring, listening, waiting. When the faint breeze blew his way he could smell fur, and something else, like ice water or bitter herbs. From time to time people would walk past him, in two or threes, quick and quiet and unquestioning but with undertones of gossip to be had as soon as they got out of earshot.

He wondered how long it would take his aunts to find him, if he should hide when they did. They disapproved of wandering, but couldn’t actually be bother to keep an eye on him. Maybe if he asked, they’d tell him what was in the courtyard? Of course, if it really was a secret they wouldn’t tell him the important stuff, and if it wasn’t it didn’t really matter.

Lost in thought, he almost didn’t notice the new set of footsteps approaching, light as the rest of the heavenly beings, but not light enough to be one of his family members. The hand, coming to hover just above his shoulder, made him jump, and he hit his head hard on the wooden rail above him.

“... Little prince?” said a voice so cultured it had a pearlescent sheen in Kubo’s muddled mind. He rubbed his head and pulled himself to his feet, turning to face to speaker. “My prince, what are you doing here?”

Being addressed by anyone other than his immediate family was shocking, few on the moon wanted to deal with him. He was, he had gathered, a departure from the norm, and that was very much frowned upon.

“Where are you supposed to be right now?” the man asked, voice growing more patronizing by the minute.

“Nowhere,” Kubo said, “I was just watching the, um….” he gestured at the courtyard behind him, where the thumping hadn’t faltered. “Them.”

“Hmmm. Perhaps I could escort you back to the halls of your enlightened grandfather?” he suggested.

Kubo shook his head, tried to look self assured, of his place in the world. “No, I’m good here- hey, let go of me!” He threw himself to the side, away from the hands on his shoulders, guiding and pushing. His aunts he had learned to deal with, but he wasn’t going to pulled around by a ragdoll by a complete stranger.

“My apologies,” the man said smoothly, “But I insist I help you back to your family. They’re probably worried about you.”

That was arguable, but Kubo recognized when he’d been out bossed. Acting like you knew what you were doing only worked until you were faced with someone else even more certain they knew what you should be doing.

“I mean, if you want to, I can walk myself back.” he said, casually, as if it had been his idea all along.

“Please, let me accompany you.” the man said, “It would be shameful to let a child of the stars wander alone.” He didn’t try to take Kubo’s hand again, which was a point in his favour, instead he walked next to him, footfalls heavier now as if he was intentionally making noise to show the way.

After a while he asked, “What were you doing on your own in the Jade Yard?”

Kubo fiddled with the hem of his sleeve, tugged on one of the pompoms sewn to his robe, tried and failed to not look guilty. “I was just watching, er, well, listening. To the sounds.” He sounded defensive, he felt defensive. It had been a while since anyone had really tried to talk to him, and it was as unsettling as it was nice. “There’s no rule about that.”

“No, there is not.” the man agreed tranquilly. “There has never had to be a rule before. It has never been an issue before.”

“Why?” Kubo asked, curiosity beating up caution in an alleyway for neither the first nor last time. “I mean, what was happening in there? I could hear, but I couldn’t see. It sounded loud.”

His walking companion brushed the question off. “It’s of no real consequence. You, however are, young Kubo, grandson of the moon. I must apologize, we have not met properly yet, but I have heard quite a bit about you.”

“Well, I haven’t heard anything about you.” Kubo said, tucking his chin close to his chest. Something felt wrong, he hadn’t figured out what yet but it made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. He had quickly resolved not to trust anyone who’d sneak up on an innocent sneaker and he felt more confident in his choice every minute.

“Call me…. the Lord of the North Star.”

Kubo’s eyes narrowed, or at least his eyelids tried to make the motion though they were somewhat stymied by the lack of eyeballs. “That’s a weird name.”

“It is what I am. What else should a name be?”

“I don’t know.” Kubo shrugged, “Something, different. A name is the thing people call you. It has to be easy to remember. Not complicated or long.”

The North Star almost sounded amused. “Time is a concept for mortals. Why should we care how long something takes? The affairs of immortals cannot be simplified, young man.”

“Well maybe they should be!” Kubo countered, “Everything here is boring, and it takes forever, and it doesn’t seem like anyone actually cares about it. It’s just…. complicated. And long. Last time I checked my aunts were listening to a story about the sun and I’m pretty sure they’re still listening to it, and it’s been, like hours. And they already know the story anyway!”

“That does sound like it would be frustrating for someone raised in the human world. Humans rush, they must because they die. Here, there is no death, and so there is no rush. But there must be order. Order of time, order of hierarchy. Order of beauty.”

“But why?”

“If the heavens were not ordered, what hope would the mortal realm have? The stars are perfect in their dances, obedient to the laws of the cosmos. If it were otherwise, everything would fall apart. Likewise, the moon follows a strict and orderly path across the night sky. Perfection, clarity, these things are unobtainable to lesser beings, but must always be exemplified by the heavens, lest everything fall out of place.” His words had the lyrical quality of a poem, verses and strictures polished over centuries. He spoke like a teacher, confident in the truths he was about to tell.

Kubo still didn’t buy it, but he wasn’t about to contradict someone so clearly convinced of their own rightness. Instead he remained silent, until the Lord of the North Star prompted him.

“Well, what do you think of that, little moon prince?”

“I’m not a prince.”

“Well, what else could you be? You are not a star, like your mother and aunts before you, so I cannot call you that. You are not a comet, or a singer of the songs of eternity. You are not human either, so I cannot call you that. Your grandfather is the King of the Moon, and so you are a prince, and that is all I may place to your name.” It was kindly said, but not kindly meant.

“I’m Kubo. Just… Kubo.” _Kubo, son of Sariatu_ , his mind said, and his heart said other things as well, in languages he could not remember how to speak.

(He had tried to write his name once, when Grandfather was still of the opinion that he could do calligraphy if he really put his mind to it. He knew his mother had taught it. But what came out was several characters too long, and pushed Grandfather into a cold rage. Calligraphy had not been mentioned again. )

There was a stall, however brief in the steady beat of footsteps next to him. “Kubo of the moon, then.”

Kubo felt frustration welling up in his chest again. “No! I’m not- I’m not from here. It’s lying to pretend otherwise.” He couldn’t quite put into words his anger with the idea that someone could wax poetic about order and then lie in the next breath, but he was angry nonetheless.

“You seem to be quite an opinionated young man.” The Lord of the North Star said in a voice that somehow managed to outstrip Yukami in false kindness.

Kubo paused. He could hear a voice now, faint but there. The stilted cadence of poetry read in a beautiful flat voice, the sound of monotony. “It’s how I was raised, I think.” he said, striving for politeness, hoping he wouldn’t have to keep it up for long. “I can hear the poetry reading, so I guess it hasn’t stopped. I don’t want to interrupt, so I’m going to go to bed now. Thank you for walking with me.”

“Are you certain you know the way, and it is the time that you must rest?”

Kubo nodded, even though it was at least partially a lie on both counts- he still sometimes got lost but he knew how to keep from wandering too far away and he was willing to fake a nap to get away from conversations with adults who thought they knew was what best for him. He yawned widely, just to sell the story, and tried not to snicker when he heard the rustle of fabric that could only be caused by someone recoiling in shock.

“Very well,” the lord said, so smoothly Kubo wondered if he really had drawn back, or simply adjusted his robes. “Thank you for talking with me. It was very illuminating.”

Because that wasn’t at all an ominous thing to say. Kubo nodded a farewell, and made his escape. It turned out that there was one thing worse than being talked over or around like he wasn’t capable of hearing; being talked to like he was too young and stupid to tell one foot from the other. As soon as he was around a corner, he made a few faces, just to prove he could.

At least he had learned one thing, whatever was in that courtyard was important enough that the Lord of the North Star wouldn’t tell him what it was. (That or it was utterly important and the man was just that much of _jerk_. That was also a significant possibility.)

 

 

 

Sariatu’s strength begins to fade around eleven, and by noon she and Monkey are taking refuge under a maple tree. The autumn foliage is just beginning to come in, and once she’s away from the merciless gaze of the sun, Sariatu can begin to appreciate it. She does love autumn, when fire overtakes the trees and grasses, only to be drowned out by long dark nights like a lover’s caress.

And, it means her clothes are finally back in style again, so it’s a triumph on all the fronts. The only problem with it is the harvest moons, when her first and always home draws near the earth and glows as gold as the autumn leaves, so close and deceptively warm. Tricking people into thinking anything moonbound could be beautiful in heart as well as form.

Monkey is watching her, keenly intelligent eyes, sharper even than Sariatu’s. Not that it’s difficult, these days. She shades her eyes from the sunlight that insists on seeping through the foliage and looks down the path, and Sariatu looks with her.

There is rarely speech between them, one cannot talk and one can rarely pull together the words that are needed. They manage to communicate despite it.

Sariatu glances up at the sky, then the winding road again. It seems nearly impossible that they’ll reach the nearest town by nightfall. Monkey takes her hand, soft pads of skin just a little more rubbery than a human’s, and squeezes. It’s a reassurance, if a somewhat unfounded one.

Ah, well. There isn’t much she can do, except slip off her top robe to drape it over her head and try to wait out the worst of the sun.

She dozes off in the warmth and light, her head resting against the monkey’s soft flank. The feeling of coarse hair under her hands, a warm body next to her, is both startling and comforting. She has slept alone since Kubo was five.

Miss Monkey shakes her awake when the sun is still high in the sky. There is an urgency to her motions, and Sariatu stumbles out of muffling white wool dreams panicked and afraid, looking for her sisters in the orange darkness before she even opens her eyes.

There is no enemy, just paper, floating to the ground around her like square autumn leaves.

Sariatu lets her terror fade away, and tries to remember the words for soothing, for saying that nothing is wrong. She is almost sort of certain the paper has done this before, when she dreamed. The words do not come and she settles for a conciliatory shrug, then leans forward to collect the origami paper back up.

Monkey helps, and soon they have a neat stack, ready to tuck back into their travelling pack. The top sheet is red; Kubo red, beetle red. She keeps it in her hand as she puts the others away and tries to remember the way armour creased and bent, the tiny textured details.

She thinks she has an idea, but cannot voice it, out of fear that it will slip away again and because she just does not have the words.

The warrior figurine Kubo had called by her husband’s name takes form in her hands quickly, almost too easily. If she’d had ink she could have written a spell, but there is no ink, no beautiful magic to spell down. Just her.

She glances back at Monkey, who is watching her carefully, then pulls the shamisen over her shoulder, places the little doll on the ground in front of her, and concentrates on her memories of _him_.

The first taste of food on her tongue, festival music live and brilliant around her. Bright lights, humanity, skin on skin. Learning lullabies. Ringing in her ears, joy so big her chest aches, laughter at the back of her throat.

 _Bring my family back to me,_ she thinks, and strums.

The little figure crumples as life fills his stiff paper joints, bringing soft lines to what was once immobile, filling up the spaces inside it with more than just air. He stumbles for a few steps then spins in a circle. Monkey snarls, and Sariatu tries to look reassuring, tries to look like she knows what she’s doing. She mostly think she does, but her head is spinning from sunlight and moonmagic.

Her warrior freezes, pointing north. Not to the road, exactly, but they way they meant to go. North and east.

It isn’t a map, but it’s something.

There are still no words between them as they begin to walk, Sariatu shaky on her feet like a human half formed. It is not an epic quest in the usual sense. (Usually fallen gods and monkeys have a lot more power between them and don’t need to stop for breaks every few hours.) It will do. It has to.

 

 

 

The boat is not easy, especially not when they have to resort to subterfuge to get it, but it goes faster with magic on her finger tips. She hides her face from the moon, and tries not to be seen, tries not to remember Kubo's wails and the terror that accompanied her last boat ride. Luckily, she is adept at forgetting. 

They keep moving.

 

 

 

They are in the mountains and so close she can feel the shiver of magic on her skin. It’s that or hypothermia. She still isn’t very good at being human, at regulating temperature and sleep and food. Monkey helps, for Monkey is the heart she can no longer find, but it’s still not enough.

She cannot sleep. She thought she’d be better at sleeping in caves after all these years, but the long hours of the autumn night tear at her, worrying her mind and bringing back flickers of memory. Her Kubo, smiling and laughing. It takes her forever to stop pacing and curl up next to the fire.

Her warrior (not Hanzo, never Hanzo) is staring resolutely out of the cave entrance, watching the snow swirl outside, shadows twisting in the white beyond.

One shadow swirling in particular.

Sariatu sits up, jostling Monkey by accident, and as she does so her warrior makes a run for the snow drifts. She dives after him, grabbing the struggling paper figure before he reaches the boundary between the moonlight and shadow that she cannot cross.

He’s pointing, little waving arms clawing at the air in front of them. Sariatu blinks, looks up, and sees a figure looming.

It is not human, it cannot be human. She does not think humans come in shapes like that.

She can hear Monkey snarling behind her as she struggles to her knees, pushes her hair out of her face, and takes another look just in case her eyes are deceiving her.

She knows on some level that she should be terrified, but all she can manage is a sort of bewildered bafflement as Monkey pushes her back and takes a position in between her and the monster.

“That’s not your bug,” she says blankly, a sentence that would make sense to neither monster or human, that barely makes sense to her.

The figure pauses, hesitates, then offers a confused,”Whose bug am I then?”

It is not a particularly threatening line, and she feels confident enough to peer over Monkey’s shoulder and take another look at their subpar-attacker.

The silhouette, though exaggerated and distorted is still familiar. As if sensing her lack of terror, Monkey stiffens, and the silence is all she needs to be certain.

“Stag beetle.” she says. “That’s what you are.” His name is still heavy on her lips, even in the most simple of ways.

The loomer takes another step forward, and that is all that is needed to sharpen features once blurred by wind and eddying snow. “Is that me?” it says, almost eager. “Do you know me?”

The origami man is still fighting to escape her grip, and Sariatu is seized by a sudden dread. This cannot be what it led them too. This does not seem like a solution at all.

Monkey tackles him, which probably isn’t a solution either, but at least it makes her brow unknit, makes her piece her face back together from the slack jawed vacancy of confusion.

The light dusting of autumn snow that touches mountaintops is churning as the two struggle and it takes Sariatu a moment to shout loudly enough to make the pair stop.

“Can we take this inside?” she pleads, glancing up at the moon which hangs high behind them. “I need to know something. Monkey, please, let him up.”

Her fingers loosen just a little and the red warrior unfolds his way out of her grasp and makes a mad dash for the two wrestlers now frozen in the snow. He clambers up onto the chest of the beetle, and points triumphantly down at the face that matches hers in puzzlement.

There is snow in fur as Monkey creeps back to her, and snow on the wind, flakes too light to be anything but powder gently dusting the mountaintop.

The beetle is smiling at her, a hesitant, awkward sort of smile. She cannot smile back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1\. The Lord of the Northern Star is very, very loosely based on the bodhisattva Myōken, who was worshipped at some shinto shrines until the two religions were pulled apart in the 1800s. I say loosely because bodhisattvas are usually pretty good people, all around, and Myōken is a jerk. As are most immortals in this setting. He's one of the two big celestial beings I've created for this, and the only one who isn't specifically based on a character from somewhere.  
> 2\. I actually have a pretty clear timeline of Sariatu and Hanzo's romance in my head, but it is significantly less clear in Sariatu's head. One of the big themes of this piece is emotion without form, and memories without context, but it does get frustrating sometimes.  
> 3\. I know I'm bringing in elements from the movie willynilly, but Sariatu needs all the help she can get. Also, I'm a sucker for parallels.  
> 4\. Sariatu's colour scheme actually is an autumn one, traditionally. The moon is also a big thing in the autumn. That and the Bon Festival means this is all happening in early autumn, moving into late autumn and winter as time goes on.  
> 5\. Among other things, Kubo takes just a few cues from the Little Prince. Poor confused, slightly inhuman lad.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy New Years! Here's chapter four. Lots of love to everyone who's been so patient, especially creaturebelowthedeck on tumblr who drew a gorgeous piece of art of poor, blind Kubo.

Kubo was fairly sure he’d lost track of the days again.

It had been at least two weeks, he knew that much, but without the steady rhythm of sunrise and sunset it was easy to lose count.

Yori wasn’t much use if Kubo ignored him hard enough. He skipped meals when he wanted too, certain that the food would still be there later. Sleep could be long, eating irregular. More and more his days were decided by his family, who was there to shake him up and fuss at him, give him things to do or something to pay attention to.

It was all too easy to contemplate giving up, surrendering to his aunties’ alien affections, the ebb and flow of court, the hollow beauty of it. Too easy to accept forgetting.

It didn’t help that he wasn’t making much progress with the alternatives. His attempts at exploration were constantly stymied by Karasu’s herding and Yukami’s cool instruction, by insistences that he be here, do that, attend to Grandfather. They’d gotten better at keeping track of him, at finding his hiding corners and quiet distractions. Whenever he tried to go back to the courtyard, His Lordship was there, hovering in silent judgement.

He was twelve, and he only had so much patience to spare.

  
  
  


Kubo sat on the floor outside his grandfather’s hall and played with shells.

Karasu had dropped them in his lap shortly after pushing him to the floor and telling him to stay put. (In more polite words, admittedly, but the message had been clear.) The shells themselves were uncannily smooth, polished to what he suspected was a sheen, perfect ovals delicately painted with patterns and poetry.

Of course, Kubo couldn’t actually match them, so instead he was seeing how tall of a tower he could make.

He was five precariously balanced shells high and trying to guess how much the whole thing was tilting, when the hallways developed an infestation of people. It was hard to tell how many, since residents of the Moon had an annoying habit of floating, but he could smell at least ten courtier’s worth of perfume and feel a dozen eyes on him.

He hunched up his shoulders and dropped another shell onto the stack, delighting in the clatter as the entire thing came tumbling down.

There was a soft noise, too civilized to be classified as a throat clearing or even a cough. Much to Kubo’s dismay the sound of it was familiar.

He tilted his head up so he couldn’t be accused of ignoring the speaker, and waited.

“Little prince, is your esteemed grandfather inside?” the Lord of the North Star asked, crisp and infuriatingly neutral.

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know.” his celestial lordship repeated skeptically.

Kubo shrugged and started flipped the shells face up. “No one tells me anything,” he said, letting himself sound young. He didn’t mind be underestimated if it got people to leave him alone.

“I see.”

“You could go in and check, probably.” Kubo suggested blithely, even as he heard his auntie approaching and the click of screens sliding back.

“This is a surprise,” Yukami murmured. “You know grandfather does _so_ hate surprises.” Her identification of him as ‘grandfather’ rather than ‘father’ was the only acknowledgement she gave of Kubo’s presence.

“It is a surprising time for all of us.” the lord said stiffly. “We wished to speak to you, so that you could pass a message onto your sovereign father.”

“Such a request is… sudden, but not improper.” Yukami conceded. “Three of you may come into the antechamber… yes, Kubo?”

Kubo, mind racing, faked a yawn. “I’m going to go to bed,” he declared to the room at large, “I’m tired.”

Yukami didn’t sound convinced very convinced but she waved him off with a dismissive, “Fine.,” then seemed to reconsider and added, “But first say goodnight to your aunts and grandfather.”

Kubo obediently bounded to the doorway- knocking the shells over in his haste- and bowed quickly to the family he couldn’t see through the door. Yukami let her hand rest on the top of his head for a lingering moment, but then it was gone and he was free to make a strategic retreat full of “beg pardons” and “sorrys” as he stumbled through the thicket of heavenly beings who reacted like puppets in a play, their movements jerky and uncertain.

Once the air no longer smelled quite so much of heavy incense and the wintery atmosphere that nobility seemed to carry with them, Kubo started to think.

He didn’t have any illusions that the Lord was going to tell Grandfather how utterly charming and precocious he was. And unexpected visit was probably about him, after all as far as he could tell he was the first unexpected thing to happen to this place since his mother. He walked a little further, just to make sure no one was watching, turned a few corners until the air felt a little less confined, then jumped the balustrade, off of the walkway and to the ground below.

It was not the finely combed gravel and perfectly shaped rocks of the gardens, here in the untamed space beyond the palace the landscape was something else entirely. Fine dust, rough to the touch, compressed easily underneath him. While he knew getting covered in dirt would give the game away, time was of the essence.

He crawled along the ground, staying low so as not to be spotted and using one hand to track the path above.

The place was a maze of walkways, but at least the rooms were static. Hangings stayed rolled up or let down, partitions never changed, screens and blinds that seemed like they should be mobile remained stuck solidly to the floor. Kubo was fairly sure he could eavesdrop, or get caught trying.

Anything was better than staying still and being quiet, because quietness got easier every day.  
  
The air was so still, even the dust did not billow around him like it should have. Half his heart thought if beautiful, the other half was horrified for reasons he could not fully understand.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


“What’s his name?” the beetle asks, letting her warrior run from hand to hand to hand to hand. He has four of them.

Sariatu pauses, runs a hand through Monkey’s fur to reground her heart and says, “He doesn’t really have one. He’s just... a map.”

“Map isn’t a very good name.” the beetle says solemnly, then adds, “Although, I suppose I can’t judge on the naming front. I don’t even have a name.”

The fire is well banked for the night, the embers smouldering and casting long shadows around them. She is sitting against the back wall, stiff with sorrow and made shy by confusion. Miss Monkey is crouched by the side of the fire, watchful in a way she could never be. The beetle is oblivious. She supposes oblivious is better than malicious, but that is small recompense after her plan failed so spectacularly.

She cannot help but be frustrated, that she is barely any closer to the armour, that her magic is so unpredictable even at it’s best, that all she has to go on now is a suspicious and probably not irrelevant bug.

More than a bug, her bug. Hanzo’s, really. Hers by marriage at best.

The villagers had never cared about the clan names and politics she had tried so hard to learn in her first months with Hanzo. They had one name, perhaps two or three counting the nicknames so often handed out. But she had whispered Kubo’s full name to him when he slept by her chest as an infant, taught him how to write it in the dirt during long nights and early mornings- back in the days when she could almost function in the sunlight. His education had faltered as her health did, but he knew his name, knew his lineage as far as Sariatu could remember it.

 _Kuwagata_. The Stag Beetle, Clan of.

The insect-man who sits awkwardly and lets paper men skitter over his shoulders, who stares cross eyed as the samurai doll peers down at him from his carapaced pate, it is impossible to imagine he wasn’t important, somehow, someway.

“What about Beetle? He looks like a Beetle. No wait, that’s my name.” The beetle purses his lips. His mustache looks like it has been drawn on with ink. It is ridiculous and distracting. “What about Akio? Or Takeshi?” he paused, “Hanzo?”

The abrupt shock was enough to startle Sariatu into action. “How do you know that name?” she demands. “Who are you?”  
  
“I... don’t actually know,” he admits, “I mean, I know I know it, I think, but other than that, everything is blank.”

“Impossible,” Sariatu says through her teeth, though she knows curses and she knows unearthly magic when she sees it. “Human memory is not that malleable. You are not of the heavens, nothing is absolute with you. How do you know Hanzo? Why do you wear that shape?”

Now it is Monkey’s turn to calm her down. Frustration transitions to easily to rage, Sariatu has learned, or perhaps has always known. The Beetle looks startled, but there is still a look in his eyes that Sariatu knows too well. Recognition, faint and fleeting, there but not quite corporeal.

“I’m.. sorry.” she says. “That name means a great deal to me. What were you saying about a curse?”

The beetle twiddles his thumbs, two pairs of hands folding together nervously. “Not a problem, um, ma’am. If I’m honest I came to you for answers, but I’ll go first.” He clears his throat dramatically. Miss Monkey gives Sariatu a look of disbelief, one that Sariatu might have be inclined to mirror if there wasn’t so much on the line, if she had _any_ other leads.

“I’ve roamed these lands for many a year. At least ten. I think I lost track at some point, but definitely nine plus.”

“I am cursed to forever roam, not knowing who I am or where I came from, only glimpsing the truth in flashes. Sometimes I’ll get a little memory, or I’ll get the idea to go somewhere and find something, but it never adds up. I was a great warrior once though,” he adds. “And… I think I knew this Hanzo. His name rings a bell. He was a friend? No, that’s not it. It’ll come to me, don’t worry.” He tries to smile reassuringly, which only revealed a missing tooth.

Her heart skips a beat. Ten years? Ten, or _eleven_?

“You were a warrior?” she says, tentatively.

“Maybe?” he replies. They are both asking each other nothing but questions, but maybe if they ask enough they will arrive at the truth.

“Who were you cursed by?”

“I don’t know… someone though, surely. No one ends up memoryless without a curse.” he says, with honest confidence. She can feel the icy disdain in the pit of her stomach, like a memory from the past. Nights of blood and moonlight, uncaring and dismissive.

Sariatu is almost glad for the dullness in her head, it stifles the unkindness in her heart.

“I wouldn’t go that far.” she says, and leaves the sentence hanging, awkwardly between them while she refines a more productive thought.

Beetle is quick to fill the empty air. “I know you,” he says, “I know I do. You are… a princess? On a quest. You must be at least one, in those clothes, in this place. And you were-” he catches the little samurai before he topples from one of his helmet-like horns and stares down at the little figure in his hands intently.

Sariatu gives him time, and hopes.

“Hanzo, he was someone important.” the beetle says finally. “A lord, my lord? There was a battle, you see. Such a battle.”

He looks up at her and his eyes look like suns or gleaming gold coins, metallic in the warm cast of the fire.

“And you.”

Swordplay and magic are woven deep into her core, but her father made a princess first and foremost. If there is one thing she is practiced in, it is the regal nod. So she delivers one, a tight little incline of the chin.

The wonder and delight in his expression is almost enough to chase the cold winds outside away.

“I know you! You were, you were…”

“Hanzo was my husband,” she supplies helpfully. The beetle’s mood is infectious, and feelings swirl like sand within her, each grain a new shade of sorrow and joy and determination.

He kneels so fast his head almost ends up in the fire. “You, you’re my master’s lady.” he says, straightening back up. He sounds utterly confident, like there’s no way in the world he could be wrong.

Sariatu is more cautious.

“We don’t know that,” she says, “We can’t.” She is wary of tricks, her father’s machination or her sisters’ idle games.  
  
The little samurai has run around the fire to stand at Sariatu’s knee. Like Miss Monkey, he cannot speak, but he has ways of making his opinion known. He points his sword at the beetle, empathetically.

She had asked him to help her. Perhaps this is the form in which help comes. Large, and four armed.

Monkey’s fur, on the other hand, still stands a little on edge. It is strange that two beings made of Sariatu’s own soul can disagree so vehemently. Perhaps it is a sign of how muddled her own mind is.

Beetle, at least, seems confident. More than confident, he’s glowing. His shining eyes- more bronze than gold, Sariatu decides- seem locked on her face as he scampers a little closer around the fire. He stops when Monkey growls, but he’s still vibrating with excitement.

“I can prove it!” he insists, “I have things, thing’s I’ve collected over the years, things that reminded me of my past. You said it was the Beetle Clan, didn’t you? I can show you.” he amends it with a quick, “If you would like. Ma’am.”

She would like, but the moon is still in the sky, accusing in its gaze. She glances outside their cave, tries to calculate the time till sunrise. “We’ll have to wait until morning.” she says, then explains for the sake of comradely honesty, “Otherwise my father might kill me.”

“Oh,” the Beetle mulls this over for a minute then nods. “Okay.”

Sometimes, she wishes someone would actually question her existence. It is, she knows, a rather fanciful one. It is not vanity to admit that she is exceptional, she knows better than anyone what magic she is made of and what a life she has lived, and she’s more than a little concerned that more people aren’t concerned about it.

On the other hand, she’s sitting next to a giant bug, so perhaps asking him to be perturbed by something as small as filicide is just too optimistic.

  
  
  
  
  
  


After yards of crawling Kubo heard voices and ducked instinctively. Low on the ground, breathing particles of the moon, he reassessed.  
  
There had been no change in the air gently moving around him, no sudden breeze to mark the movement of someone nearby. The air was so still, every little motion threw up eddies that he was just beginning to learn to interpret.

The voices were soft as well, muffled by distance and thin walls, faint echoes of formulaic formality.

He moved more slowly, staying so low to the ground that he inhaled particles of the moon, bits of rough dust climbing up his nose and into his throat as he clawed his way across the ground, inch by inch.

He turned a corner, and the air flowed more freely. The space behind him was open and wide and unknown. He did not dare venture too far into that wildland. He had to stay close to the foundations, keep underneath the floorboards and in understandable territory.

The voices were growing clearer now. If he remembered correctly, there was an open walkway encircling the room that encircled Grandfather’s sanctum, with sliding doors glued in place by lack of use. If he lay flat on his back and wiggled under the floor, he could hear…

The voices were not familiar, at least not at first. Strange titles droned on, with strange and empty inflections. People were, Kubo gathered, introducing themselves. Lord of this, attendant of that, poetess of the ninth house of heaven and gatekeeper of the sixth.

It was boring, but in between it all he could hear twin breaths, twin movements. Nods and gestures mirrored over, the exagerated breathiness of the bored. He knew it because he wanted to sigh the same way, in the close and smothering dustiness of the Underneath The Floors Place.

If he breathed in enough of the moon, would he become the grandchild his grandfather wanted? Or would a tiny moon perhaps grow in his lungs? Serious questions sprang to mind in such enclosed spaces.

The introductions finally ground to a halt, and Kubo tried not to breath in the ensuing silence. He could not trust his pounding heart not to give him away, and he wished for a moment for the slow and sluggish pulse he felt sometimes when his aunts held his hands and pulled and pushed him around.

“I trust you know, we would not disturb you for trivial matters.” The Lord of the North Star said after a weighty pause.  “And we come only because we believe the issue at hand to be both pressing and of delicate nature.”

“The nature of all things is delicate.” Yukami said, something like dismissiveness in her tone. “It is the habit of the universe to be exacting. But please, continue on.”

“Well said,” the Lord of the North Star conceded, though the sentiment did not quite reach his words. “But some matters require more attention, do they not? In particular, we have come over concerns about the wellbeing of the child, your nephew.”

There was a stony silence, which Karasu finally broke. She wasn’t the best at waiting.

“I do not see how is your concern,” she said, waspishly.

“The court is my concern,” the lord replied smoothly. “Is _our_ concern. The boy is- well, far be it from me to question the king of this eternal plane, but the boy does not seem to my humble eyes to be fitting in well. He is making- hmm- trouble.”

“Explain,” one of the twins demanded.

“I have seen him walking the halls, running through them, peering in things he should not be,” the Lord of the North Star said hastily. “A fortnight ago I saw him in the Jade Courtyard, unattended. Then there was the incident in the hall of dances, quite unusual. And, well, he is human, your majesty.”

“Half human!” Karasu snapped, but there was uncertainty beneath it.

“Calm down, sister.” Yukami told her. “His lordship comes with a concern, nothing more. Let us soothe his well meaning worries. Kubo is no threat at all. We have him completely under control.”

“He is a child! He eats, he sleeps! I have it on good authority that he bleeds. He does not belong here, surely.”

There were murmurs of assent.

One whispery voice added, “With all respect… the child is not of this world. He does not seem happy here.”

“He breathes so loudly.”

“He asks so many questions.”

“He fidgets.”

“It may be hidden, but I can smell the food rotting within him.”

“His bickers with his elders, he wanders, he cries.”

“With all humbleness, he does not seem to belong....”

The voices stopped suddenly, as if cut off. Little gasps of fear hung in the air for just a moment, before an eerie silence fell, and Kubo could feel himself become the loudest thing in the vicinity again. They were right. Just by existing, he was a little too much.

“Your majesty.” the Lord of the North Star said. Nothing else, just that. Like he’d made his case and was now waiting for the response.

“I do not think-” Yukami began, but shut up abruptly as someone else took center stage. Every one else did as well. The swish of robes and the click of wood on wood was deafening. The little step forward seemed too ominous for such a small sound.

“You _presume_ ,” Grandfather said, fury tamped down like snow, ready to become a projectile weapon. “You _dare_ question my authority, not only over this realm but over my own family? Do you truly believe I am so helpless that I would not notice the actions of my own grandchild? That I would somehow be blind to the clumsy machinations of boy barely a decade old? You think I do not know these things, and you think wrongly. He is restless, yes. His life is unstructured and his existence is unrefined. But he is _mine_ , and I will not have my blood slandered, or my competence at all placed in doubt.”

“My daughter’s son is twice cursed, his birth was unfortunate and his parentage is doubly so. But he is of the heavens and in the heavens he shall remain. He will learn. He will grow. In time, he will drink the elixir. And in doing so, he will shed the restrictions and frailties that so offend you.”

“Your majesty, we only hoped to communicate-” the Lord of the North Star did not sound so dangerous now. Grandfather could scare anyone, Kubo knew that. But he’d never heard demonstrated quite like this.

“It does not matter what you hoped. What you have done is undermined the order of this celestial sphere. You have second guessed me, you have doubted me. You have done more damage than my grandson ever could.”

Kubo felt his breath coming even faster, and with every inhalation he had to fight back the itch in the back of his throat, the urge to cough out the dust and gasp for clean air.

“Do you understand that?” Grandfather asked.

“Yes,” the Lord of the North Star murmured, chatsied. His supporters were strangely silent, as if they’d run out of words to give now that the meeting had veered so far off course.

“Good, then leave me. I have had quite enough of insubordination for now. Take these puppets you have found and return them to their places, and then think on the chaos you have brought into this place of peace and eternal serenity.”

The sounds of movement, cloth whispering against wood, the sigh of silk on silk, filled the air.

“My apologies for the slight, your radiance.” the Lord of the North Star said, a little less cowed, like he was finally regaining his balance after the scolding. “We have nothing but faith in your ability to prevent another tragedy from occurring in your venerable household.”

Kubo didn’t think you could hear a sneer, but he suspected his aunts were wearing them.

The dissolving ruins of the attempted advisory committee shuffled out. When the sound of soft footsteps finally faded away, Kubo felt the tension in his chest ease a little, but not enough. What he’d just heard weighed heavily on him.

The idea that nothing he could do mattered, it scared him. What scared him even more was the way Grandfather had talked, so hateful. He’d never thought… his family could be a bit unkind but he hadn’t thought they hated him. He hadn’t realized how much they disliked his human half.  
  
To have someone hate half of you was pretty much the same as them hating the whole you, for half a person was not a person at all.

In a daze, he rolled over and tried to maneuver his way out from underneath the floor space.  He couldn’t quite raise his body enough to crawl, but he could pick his head and torso up and use his arms to push himself back, to opener air and the promise of escape.

“Kubo.” Grandfather said loudly. “I know you’re there. Come out, now.”

His mind froze.

“ _Kubo_.”

There was a rush of wind, the muted sound of two pairs of feet hitting the ground behind him. He moved forward on pure intuition, pulling himself further underneath the building above him. The hunch proved accurate, as someone grabbed at his ankles and missed by inches.

“Kubo!” Yukami called, “Kubo, come ou-ut!” Her singsong never had seemed particularly cheerful.

He kept squirming further, hands out infront of him so he didn’t run into the posts that held the floor and walls and ceilings up over his head. He didn’t have a plan, other than to get out, to get away.

“Kubo-oo!”

The long sound of his name, spoken like music and a curse all at once, brought back flashes of memory. A forest, running. Someone very small holding his hand. The moon overhead, too close and too low. A breathless feeling of dread, his mother screaming. His mother’s screams.

Tears wetted the cloth of his blindfold, and his chest ached, but he couldn’t stop moving. Not now.

His aunts were not following him, were not tearing up the floor to get to him. That was a good thing, he guessed. It was a big palace, there were plenty of places to hide beneath.

Kubo figured if they were determined to make him something else, all he could do was be impossible for the time being. Surely, they would forgive him his childishness, if they thought of him as such a burden already.

Besides, he did not want to hear their voices. Not now. He needed to be human, and here that meant being alone.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


“Are you sure you don’t need any help?” Beetle asks, as Sariatu clambers  through the cave entrance. He’s hovering, not in the literal sense but a more temperamental one.

(Can he fly? She doesn’t know.)

The attitude of the would be helper- hands outstretched and fanned out as iff to catch the air, leaning forward ready to pounce should she falter, eyes full of well meaning, stifling kindness- is familiar to her. She’s learned not to take offense at the implication of helplessness on her part. She is helpless, after all.

Monkey steadies her, soft hands at the small of her back as she picks her way down, because she helps herself, even in the most roundabout of ways. It is not easy to get to, by cave standards, and she has quite a bit of experience with caves.

It strikes her that maybe people need to branch out, herself included.

She makes it down, eventually, and Beetle stops looking quite so concerned. He has been fussing, since the sun came out and she nearly fainted stepping into the daylight that shone like a diamond, brilliant and hard.

“It’s a little further ahead.” Beetle says, beckoning them down a tunnel. “Watch your step, there are some suspicious, ah, bones here.”

“It’s homey.” Sariatu says, and realizes she may have just been accidentally sarcastic. Her samurai, sitting on her shoulder, half hidden by the fall of her hair, prods her.

Fortunately, the beetle does not seem to notice. “Yeah, yeah it is. Are you sure you don’t need help?”

“I’m _fine_. I simply have some trouble in the day, that is all.” She steps carefully over the bones, tries to remember how to be kind. It was easier with Kubo around.

“Were you cursed as well?”

“No, no. Not, in a sense. But I was born a creature of the night, and even cut off from the source of my magic, you cannot escape your birth. And…” one hand, still folded in her sleeve, reaches up to touch her scar. “I was injured. I should have died, would have if I were mortal. As it is, it’s harder for me to manage my magic now.”

Yukami had helped a little, even if her reason for doing so was pure spite. Even a taste of immortality was enough to revitalize her. And with Kubo gone, her worst nightmares come true, she did not need to conserve her strength so much.

“Oh.” Beetle says, and his tone makes it very clear that he has little to no idea what she’s talking about. Monkey, still holding onto Sariatu, the two of them supporting each other, makes a noise in between a scoff and a very quiet shriek.

They step out of the tunnel and into a wider chamber, tragically sunlit but otherwise quite beautiful. The ceilings are high, the floor even. The corners are piled with things, scraps of wood and cloth and other unidentified objects.

And oh, it looks so right. The lines of the armour, rusting in a half put together stack, it makes her breath catch. Pieces of a screen, a worn box. A bow on the wall, a naginata placed carefully in a holder above. Paper, glass, lanterns, in various states of ruin but all finer of make and more dignified of purpose than the simple trappings of the village.

“Well, we’re here. Home sweet cave.” Beetle gestures broadly, and his face lights up as a thought strikes him. The previous conversation is almost forgotten, on both their parts. The cave is too much to think around. It sheer mass of things collected within, demands the full attention of any onlooker.

Sariatu is still trying to come to terms with the way every inch of battered matting and metal hums in her mind’s eye, the way it whispers like an old friend. She lived as a lord’s wife for six months until Kubo was born and a year after. Even if the things here are not hers (and they are, she can feel it in her heart) they are still too familiar, too much a wonted thing in a strange and unaccustomed place.

Beetle is scurrying up the walls, all six legs moving, and then he scurries back down and darts to the entrance where Sariatu stands, entranced. Something red and flowing is balled in his hands, inexorably drawing the eye.

Monkey has slunk off to inspect, apparently having decided the insect is not that much of a threat, and Sariatu does not have anyone to collapse onto, and therefore should probably try not to collapse. Even if Beetle is waving Hanzo’s flag in front of her.  
  
His crest, her son’s crest, brilliant black on unfaded red. The paint does not seem to have suffered in the least over the years. Hanzo always had been a little ridiculous about banners. It should be no surprise that they’ve survived so long, when they were made to last a decade.

Still, she had not thought… she had not considered that anything could have survived her father. The Moon King’s wrath is infamous, and his revenge is absolute. Everything of Hanzo, she had suspected it lost forever.

It seems almost cruel that here it all is, piled and stowed away and taken care of by a giant bug, when the last remaining child of the Beetle Clan is so utterly lost. Perhaps that had been Yukami’s idea. Her sister always did have a taste for ironic punishments. She would have loved the idea of letting Hanzo’s memory linger on, hidden and almost forgotten, dying by inches as rust and rot and time took their course.

Beetle’s hands are not shaking, no warrior would let their control be so compromised. But his face is creased with concentration, and he’s holding the corners of the banner too tightly.

“This, was ours. Was his.” Beetle frowned, “Before we lost.”

“Hanzo,” Sariatu whispers, and reaches out a hand, just to make sure it’s real. It is, and she withdraws quickly rather than be overwhelmed.

“You are the wife of my master.” Beetle says. He’s said it before, but he seems to mean it more now. “Are you the only one who survived?”

Sariatu draws herself back together and shakes her head. “No. My son, Hanzo’s son, he lives. He has been stolen from me, but I’m going to get him back.”

“My master’s son lives? I have a purpose then. I’ll help you!”

She tries to let him down gently. “This, is not your fight. My father is more powerful than you can imagine, and more despicable.”

“I’m a giant bug with four arms _and_ I can fight.”

He has a point there. Her samurai can tell too. He looks unreasonably smug, for someone made out of paper.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  


Kubo lost track of where he was. There was no sight, no air. Nothing but sound and touch. Moon dust underneath him, smooth wood above. There were obstacles in his way, but those were easily avoided, as long as he took care not to get his robes stuck on anything.

He probably would have fallen asleep down there, if not for the music.

It wasn’t a shamisen, the notes were too high and clear, with none of the twang and hum he knew. The name of an instrument hovered on the tip of his tongue, but he could not coax it into reality.

Still, it was beautiful.

The lone melody did not have the pomp and circumstance of the court, or the effortless beauty of Grandfather’s pieces. The music stopped and started, scales lifting up and falling down, thoughtless and unpolished but with obvious talent lying underneath.

He had not heard playing like that here before.  

Kubo followed the sound, though it brought him closer to the promise of fresh air and the threat of his aunts. He was far from Grandfather’s sanctum, in some corner he had not explored before, some outlying hallway or supernumerary building, part of the endless sprawl of the Moon King’s realm. Besides, he’d cried himself out, he could get caught now.

Dim light on both sides, the faintest of breezes, it was one of the long walks that protruded out, connecting wings and giving way to tasteful pavilions. The music was coming from the end of it.

He wormed his way down, trying to stay hidden but not trying that hard. The music had shifted into a song, simple and a little sad. The strings were plucked individually, two of three at once now, and the hum when two sounds reverberated off each other was soothing. Kubo rested his head in his arms, and listened, let himself relax into the melody.

The music stopped.

“Who’s there?”

Kubo hesitated for only a moment before rolling out from under the floor, into the sunlight. Dust gave way under him, his every movement pressing down and marking the ground.

He wasn’t sure what moondust looked like, if it glittered or shone of it’s own accord, but he was definitely covered in it.

“You are-” the woman said, every word careful, “That is to say; you do not belong here.”

“No,” Kubo said. “I don’t. I’m Kubo.”

“The Moon King’s grandson?”  
  
“Yes. I liked your music,” he said quickly, folding his arms around himself.

“Oh, thank you.” There was a pause, then she said kindly, “Why don’t you come up here?”

Kubo stumbled forward, following the sound of shallow, strangely laboured, breathing until he found the railing and could clamber over it He hit the floor with both feet, enjoying the sudden noise in the silence.

“Over here,” she said, helpfully. Her voice was soft, it sounded like petals felt, smooth and forgiving. Kubo took a few steps forward, nudged a piled mound of feathers and silk with his toe, and sidestepped so as to avoid the mass of robes that surrounded anyone of status. She wore feathers too, like his aunts, like him.  

The woman, for her part, seemed to be staring. He thought he could feel her eyes on him, a ticking sense in the back of his head.

“You’re absolutely covered in regolith,” she said, in the tones of someone who was watching bird swim, awed and slightly concerned.

“What?”

“The dirt.”

Kubo touched his front self consciously, and patted off a layer of the dust that- true to her word- did cover him. He could feel it inside his robes, roughening silk into something baser. It had mixed with the tear tracks on his cheeks and dried, streaks of unearthly earth painted onto his face. It had even found its way into his hair, scraping his scalp and falling from his topknot and onto his shoulders when he moved.

“I guess I am.”

The woman plucked a single note and let it hang in the air, before she asked, “Why?”

It was a simple question, but somehow it managed to sound kind in intent. Kubo scrubbed at his face with the heels of his hands, trying to look a little more presentable, not really wanting to get in trouble no matter how hard he tried not to care. “I was hiding.” he told her. Then, to change the subject, “What are you playing?”

“The koto. Here, may I?” She took his hand gently, tugged him down to her level so he was kneeling on the too-smooth planking with her, then guided his hand until he could feel the silk of strings pulled taut. There were at least a dozen of them, more than he was used to, and it took him a few minutes of experimenting to figure out the lay of the instrument.

The high notes were closer, the lower ones further away. He flicked his way up a scale, then winced as his fingers stung.

“You need a pick,” he said, “Something to strum with.” With music, he could be confident. Even on the moon, it followed the same rules.

“I have tsume,” she said, and touched the back of his hand with two fingers, each tipped with little ovals of something hard and smooth.

Kubo nodded, “I think I’ve seen this played before,” he said conversationally, losing himself in the chance to pretend at normality. “But I can’t remember. What was that song?”

“I can’t remember either.” she confessed, her voice a little tight. “Tell me, little prince, what is it you have forgotten?”

He didn’t balk at the title, not now. He’d almost gotten used to it. He did not hesitate to speak either. If grandfather already knews his heart, if the Lord of the North Star had been able to pick up on his intentions so easily, surely he cannot conceal anything from this woman.

Besides, she was _nice_. He’d missed niceness more than he realized.

“My people, the people I knew on earth. Growing up there.”

“Mhmm. You cannot see it, even now?”

Kubo frowned. “See what?”

“The earth. It’s in front of us now, just over the horizon. This is the best place to see it, so I come and play here, sometimes.” she confessed. “You really are blind, aren’t you?”

“I don’t have any eyes, so yeah.” Kubo said. “What does the earth look like?”

A few more pensive strums down the koto. She’d played to think, Kubo realized. He could sympathize with that. Of course, so did Grandfather, so perhaps it wasn’t that much of a testament to character.

“Round,” she said finally. “So round and blue.”

“Really?”

“Really,” she promised. “You can see clouds, swirling over the seas. The land seems so small, from up above. Does it seem small down there?”

“No,” Kubo said, trying to tease a memory out. “I don’t think so.” That wasn’t entirely true though. He could remember his mother, staring out over the ocean in the afternoon, the two of them watching the sun set in the evening. The sea was big then. “Can you see the people?”

She giggled, and he was reminded of his aunts. Her laugh wasn’t as mean spirited as theirs though. “It’s far too large for that. There is so, so much of it.”

“You sound like you like it,” Kubo ventured.

A flat note, discordant and distasteful to the ears, stopped as soon as it was started. “No. It is a place of such suffering. Everyone knows that.”

Kubo’s hands curled into fists. “I don’t know that. I can’t even remember it.”

“Neither can I. No one can, except for your grandfather and his children. It is safer that way, if the heavens are separate from the realms of men.” She said it with little confidence.

“Then why are you looking at it?”

She was smiling again, he could hear it in her voice, but it wasn’t a good smile. “It’s a bad habit.”

Kubo dared to reach out and touch the instrument on front of her again. He liked the inlays pressed into the polished wood of the board. He liked feeling like there was something he understood.

Music had been how he and his mother talked to each other. She had taught him how to play before he could spell his name, and he realized now that her own father had taught her in turn. Even when she grew sicker, he mind wandering and her stamina abandoning her, they could still play. They’d trade the shamisen between them, and she’d show him old techniques while he played her the songs he’d invented during the day for… he couldn’t remember.

He couldn’t remember, but the music was still there.

She leaned in, her hair falling with a soft swish over her shoulder. She was taller than Kubo, a woman grown, but with their heads both bent over the koto it almost felt equal.

She nudged his hand to the line of bridges running down the middle, under the strings. Then she whispered, “Your aunts are coming.”

Kubo’s shoulders curled in, and he pulled his hands back, folding them in his lap. He suddenly remembered that he was filthy, and had just fled from the scene of an attempted eavesdropping.

It was probably best to look contrite.

He heard them both alight on the railing, their cloaks falling around them. Wind always heralded their presence. They did not take care to mute themselves, like others did.

“Naughty, naughty boy.” Yukami scolded, dropping to the floor. “You worried grandfather so, and you’ve ruined your clothes.”

Kubo folded his arms.

Yukami touched his cheek, tsking at the grime still plastered there. Her hands were careful though, and he relaxed a little. She remembered, this time, that he was not easy to mend if broken.

“Come on,” Karasu said, “I am sure this lady does not want your company, not with you in this state.”

“I don’t mind,”

“Hmph. Nephew, stand up. Grandfather wants to speak to you. You have been so difficult today.”

Kubo stood rather than be pulled to his feet. He wasn't afraid, somehow. Just resigned. “Thank you, for letting me listen to your music.” he said politely. “I’ll come back sometime, when I’m less… less dusty.”

“Please do,” the lady with the koto said, “Perhaps we could play a duet.”

Kubo wanted that, but he wanted her to talk about the earth more.

 _He would learn_ , that was what Grandfather had said. Perhaps he would. But he would listen first.

  
  
  
  
  


“I’ll need this, definitely,” Beetle says, hefting a bow. “Or this one?”

Sariatu isn’t really listening anymore. As hard to ignore as he is, there are more interesting matters at hand.

Her past is laid out before her for the taking, and all she has to do is look.

She opens another box, and finds paper, folded letters and accounts that look like they were written just yesterday, She flicks through them, but the names are not familiar and so the box is discarded.  
  
The next one holds a pipe, wrapped in cloth, unused but elegant. A netsuke of ivory lays next to it. Probably both gifts, but she cannot tell for sure. They do not strike any chord in her mind, and so she wraps them back up as well.

There’s a crash from behind her, and a yelp. She trusts the latter means he’s still alive, she she moves onto the next box in the stack.

“Do you want a sword?” Beetle asks.

It takes her a second to respond. “No.”

“Are you sure? I have, like, seven of them.” There’s another crash. Monkey shrieks as well this time. She’s a little worried they’ll murder each other on accident while she’s not looking, but she doesn’t want to leave anything in this treasure trove ignored.

It’s her son’s inheritance, and she feels a need to catalogue it for him, even if she’ll just forget.

The next box makes her heart skip a beat.

In it is a comb, made of lacquered wood and decorated with flowers, and it’s _hers_. Hers, utterly and absolutely.

Beetle peers over her shoulder. “Oh, yeah. I found that… somewhere. At some point.”

“It was a gift.” she says, holding it with both her hands. “For a festival. New Years, I think. Hanzo gave this to me.” Had it been his mothers? She can't quite recall. 

“Oh.”

Monkey has crept over to join her as well. Her eyes are curious, even if she’s still trying to pull a bug out of her fur.

Sariatu smiles, and shows off her find. She can’t help but be a little giddy as she drags the comb through Monkey’s fur, and Monkey pats her hand in what she thinks is thanks.

Her samurai drops from Beetle’s shoulder to her’s, breaking the spell. Beetle shifts, and holds out a rusting sword like a present.

“You know, they’re good to have in a fight.”

Sariatu shakes her head. “No. We’ll have a sword soon enough.”

“Right, right. The Sword Untouchable.” He’s had the situation explained to him, more or less.

“Unbreakable.”

“Right, that’s what I said.” He’s staring at the comb in her hand, curious and a little thoughtful. “It is pretty."

“Hmm? Oh, yes. I suppose it is.” It is nothing compared to the beautiful things she grew up surrounded by. It’s true value is in who it was given by. “It’s more of, a memory.”

Beetle nods sagely. “I think I understand. Memories are easier to find with help.”

That much she can’t argue with. She is not the same woman she was back then. She is not even the same woman who raised her son. She knows that shifting so utterly in nature comes easily to humans. Perhaps she should be proud that she has learned it so well. But the change is still bittersweet at best, and any echo of the past is more precious than a gem.

In her youth, she had not needed to remember. There was no before, for nothing ever changed. Now everything- her shamisen, the paper tucked in the pack on her back, Monkey’s wooden heart- is a thing to be protected.

“Are we ready to go?” Beetle asks expectantly.  
  
There isn’t much more to explore. Kubo is waiting for her.  

She stands shakily, waving off the help that is readily offered. “You know this land, so lead on.” she says. It is not much of a map but at least he knows the terrain.

She keeps the comb in her sleeve, close to hand. It is a small indulgence, that even in sunlight she can run her fingers over it and almost remember.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annotations:  
> 1\. The lady with the Koto is my second big Moon character, she's not actually an original one.  
> 2\. I really wanted to know what else was lying around Beetle's cave, so consider this a bit of wish fulfillment in that regard.  
> 3\. I'm trying to strike the right balance between "courtly" and "readable" so hope that worked out.  
> 4\. The song she's playing is loosely based off of this, except with a lot more breaks in between. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ECtZhJm5K4s)  
> 5\. The game Karasu gave Kubo was probably an ancient matching game. Sadly, not the best choice for our boy.  
> 6\. The palace on the moon is based on a Heian era mansion, which was slightly raised off the ground, although there probably wasn't quite as much space left underneath, especially under the rooms themselves. Still, I thought it fitting that such a hollow place should be hollow underneath, full of dust and emptiness. Also, plot convenience. (http://www.japantimes.co.jp/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/fv20130929a1c.jpg)  
> Edit: Also apparently one of the Sisters might in fact be named Washi, but if Laika wanted that in this fanfic they should have told me sooner. Fight me, Travis.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! thanks for bearing with me through the long update schedule. I'm relieved to say that we're probably 1/3 of the way through the fic now, assuming the chapters don't get any longer. Annotations at the end.

 

“We’re lost, aren’t we?”

“No,” Beetle says firmly, “We’re _exploring_.”

It certainly feels like they’re lost. Sariatu thinks Monkey agrees with her.

“You see,” Beetle explains as they clamber over rocks and piles of fallen leaves, “I’ve lived here for a decade, and explored most of these mountains. I’ve been everywhere _that_ way,” he gestures generally to the region behind them, where snow still dusts mountain peaks, “and I never saw a sword. That means it must be somewhere _this_ way,” he points in front of them. “You see?”

“Yes,” Sariatu says, though she really doesn’t, “It’s just…”

“What?”

“I’m almost certain we just took three right turns.” She wipes the sweat from her brow with one sleeved hand and tries not to look at the sun. She knows it’s nothing personal, but sometimes she feels somewhat upset that her aunt is so unkind to her. Twelve years in the world of mortals, and she is still not well suited to daylight.

Beetle glances behind him, lips moving frantically as he tries to do mental calculations. “Shortcut.” he declares finally, with enviable self-confidence. Her little samurai, now Beetle’s, beams in agreement.

Something about his rakish smile, his ridiculous certainty in the face of all logic, his bravery, makes her want to giggle. She shouldn’t, her son’s life is in their hands. But he’s terribly, unabashedly human, even if he does look like a giant bug.

Only humans are so stupidly kind.

They correct course a little, swinging east to face the tip of dusk. It’s just past noon, but the star’s heart in Sariatu knows the night has already begun to creep in. It is always approaching, and bringing the moon with it.

The path is steep and winding and her sandals are not made for it. Beetle offers a hand to help, and Monkey bares her teeth at him. The hand is quickly withdrawn.

“So, your, uh, chaperone doesn’t seem to like me much,” he notes.

Sariatu leans on Monkey gratefully as she climbs down the incline. The weight of her robes weighs her down, keeps her grounded. “She is made of me. Perhaps I don’t like you very much.” she jokes, and realizes that maybe they don’t have the memory between them to handle jokes. She smiles wide to make up for it.

Beetle wavers for a moment, then catches her smile and throws it back two fold. “Impossible, I’m amazing. Even I can’t not like me, and I’m around me all the time.”

“Maybe she’s just overprotective then,” Sariatu suggests.

“Like you?” Beetle asks, and gives her another chip toothed grin.

“I really can’t remember,” she admits. She knows she tried to make sure Kubo was home before dark, she knows she loved him more than anything, but clearly that hadn’t been enough. Monkey pats her arm with reassuring intent.

A stiff wind blows bits of crumbled leaves around their feet and tousles Sariatu’s hair as Beetle’s expression grows pensive. “I’m not sure you have to remember anything to know what sort of person you are. You just… know.”

It’s a nice thought, but the contrary part of her chimes in that she’s not really a person. Not in the traditional sense.

Monkey bounds ahead to check the road, giving them a careful look as she goes. Beetle is whistling into the wind, tuneless snippets of sound quickly snatched away from him. Sariatu is focusing on staying upright.

When they finally catch up with Monkey, she’s staring at a tree intently. Her eyes are as brown as the wood she was once made of. Brown like Kubo’s.  
  
She gestures them over and points to the tree, and Beetle turns to Sariatu, who shrugs. She may have given her life, but that doesn’t mean they think the exact same way. As a rogue creation herself, she’s not about to make assumptions.

“It’s a tree?” Beetle says, like he’s playing a guessing game. “Um, all its leaves have fallen off? Is it where the sword is? No?”

Miss Monkey ignores him and nods to Sariatu, indicating… something.

The tree is not very communicative, and for once she has no idea what Monkey is trying to tell her. Beetle keeps up a litany of guesses in the background as Sariatu inspects the timber in question.

“The tree is evil. No, that’s not it. You’d have attacked it by now. The tree is a clue, to something?”

It’s young, barely taller than Sariatu, and clinging to the side of a sparsely trodden path winding through the hills. In the crisp autumnal sunshine its bark gleams silver. There is a distinctive crook in its branches. One thin limb is flung out to catch travellers by surprise.

“The tree is… oh, no.” Beetle sounds more disappointed than alarmed.

“What is it?”

“I, uh, think we’ve passed this tree before.” he admits, and then leans over Sariatu’s shoulder and pulls a long dark strand of hair from a twig. Even tangled, it is too long to belong to just anyone.

Monkey looks smug, at least until she notices how Sariatu’s face falls.  
  
Still, there’s nothing for it but to keep moving.

“Let’s go the other way, this time,” she suggests, and Beetle’s smile almost makes it worth it.

  
  
  
  


They’re probably going the right way now. They checked twice. Once using the sun’s shadow and once using magic, a plucked bar of an Ainu song spell to make the leaves point true north.

A sense of cardinal direction does not guarantee that they’re headed toward the Sword Unbreakable though. Sariatu worries that they are in the wrong place entirely, that she has no hope of success. Worry lines crease deeper on her forehead, another mark of mortality.

How her sisters would laugh.

Beetle freezes next to her, then turns, eyes searching the forest to their right. It is less barren here, deep in the hills, but the coming winter has still taken its toll on the foliage.

“I hear something,” he whispers and then bounds into the trees.

Soon he is concealed by the tangled branches, and Sariatu struggles to remember his face.

“We should follow him,” she points out, but does not move until Monkey takes her hand and pulls her reluctantly along.

The shade of the trees is a balm to her soul. She ignores the brambles tugging at her hair and sleeves and hemline. The dirt and leaves already twisting into Monkey’s snowy fur is more dismaying. Fortunately Beetle has left something of a trail of destruction in his wake.

Two berry bushes and one rocky scree later they find Beetle on a road, a little wider than their winding hillside path, waving wildly at the woman- the woman!- trudging along it and pointedly not looking back at them.

“Ma’am,” he shouts, “Ma’am, can we speak to you?”

“I ain’t getting eaten by evil spirits today!” the woman hollers, still facing resolutely forward. Under different circumstances, Sariatu has to admit, walking forward at a steady pace is probably the smartest thing to do when confronted by a man-sized insect in the middle of nowhere.

“We aren’t evil spirits!” Beetle assures her at the top of his lungs.

“That’s what an evil spirit would say!” The woman looks like any of the villagers. A wrap skirt, greying hair twisted up in a headscarf, a heavy pack on her back. Muted colours, and a sensible outlook. Sariatu realizes that she’s probably not going to stop for them.

“She has a point,” Beetle whispers, then raises his voice again. “We’re on a quest!”

The little figure keeps disappearing down the road.

“Please?!” Beetle yells, to no avail.

Sariatu’s voice cracks as she shouts, “I’m looking for my son!”

The wind picks up, and the woman turns around, and slowly, cautiously, makes her way over to them. She looks younger, from the front. Her face has a roundness to it that undermines her weathered countenance, and her eyes are youthful.

“Who are you?” she asks, gruffly, still a safe few yards away.

Sariatu bows deep in thanks, and her hair falls over her shoulders to brush the ground. “I am Sariatu, and this is….” she runs out of steam halfway through, but Beetle picks it up.

“I’m Beetle, this is Monkey,” he points with his thumb, “and this is Hanzo,” he pats the little figure nestled comfortably in the nook between his chest armour and his neck. “We’re on a quest, looking for her son, Tsubo.”

“ _Kubo ,_ ” Sariatu corrects. “Kubo, of the Beetle Clan.”

The woman’s glare deepens and softens, somehow at the same time. “I… have heard of the Beetle Clan before, but it has not been spoken of here in many years.”

The dead are forgotten quickly when the living have so much to do. No one would speak much of a long dead family, wiped out in a storm from the sky.

“We seek information only, sister,” Sariatu says, pushing her hair back. “Have you heard stories of a sword in these hills, or some guardian that might be protecting it?”

The woman’s hands tighten on the straps of her pack. It’s almost as big as she is, woven from straw mats, something Sariatu has seen often but never had need to carry. “Twelve years ago, samurai of the Beetle Clan came to our village asking the same questions. I was young then, but I remember. I’ll… I’ll tell you the same thing my uncle told them. I know nothing of a sword, but there is a monster in these hills. Just west and south of here, towards the Long Lake, there’s a place no one goes. There are waterfalls, steep hills and rocks, lots of caves shaped like skulls you can’t miss it.”

Beetle cries with delight, and tries to give Monkey a congratulatory pat on the back, only to get his hand slapped away for his troubles. The little paper samurai claps, tiny hands whispering against each other. Sariatu’s heart soars.

“Thank you. That’s very helpful,” she manages to say.

Their miracle informant nods, still guarded. “I’m happy to be of help. May I go now? I need to get home, my daughter probably has dinner on by now.”

It’s getting late, she realizes. They’ll need to move fast or lose another night to waiting. “Of course, we’re sorry to keep you.”

The woman doesn’t bother with niceties, just resettles her burden of her shoulders and turns back to the road. Before she goes she takes a step toward Sariatu and tells her softly, “One mother to another, I hope you find your son.”

Another bow is not enough thanks for her help, but they both have children waiting for them, so it must suffice.

  
  
  
  


* * *

  


 

 

 

His aunts were restless. Well, mostly Auntie Karasu was restless. Aunt Yukami was flat out avoiding him. He wasn’t sure which was worse.

It didn’t help that the one fed into the other. The longer Yukami stayed away, the more angry Karasu got. She refused to leave him alone now, except in his own room. He suspected Grandfather had told her not to.

Grandfather was avoiding him too. He hadn’t even given Kubo a very good talking to, he’d just rattled on about honor and dignity for a while, then sent him to his room. Maybe Grandfather thought he didn’t have to pretend to like Kubo anymore, now that he already knew how he really felt.

It was… disheartening to say the least. Perhaps it was a good thing that his aunt was being difficult enough for two people. He couldn’t get a good sulk in edgewise.

Being grumpy was tough to pull off when someone else was being even grumpier.

Case in point, the moment at hand.

  
  
  
  


“Again!” Auntie Karasu snapped, as Kubo picked himself up off the ground. “Block high, then block low. It is not difficult, little boy.”

She’d learned how to teach, sort of. Learned how to give instructions, at least. Unfortunately she still didn’t have the best grasp of half-human limitations

Rather than follow her orders for the ninetieth time Kubo staggered away, towards the ornamental lake he knew lay past the gravel courtyard. When his feet reached the rocky edge of the pool, he dropped to his knees and scooped up double palmful of water. It was cold enough to burn and made his teeth hurt, but he was glad of it all the same. His skin was hot with exertion and a cold sweat was seeping through his clothes. Swordplay was _hard_.

“Kubo,” Karasu said, simply.

“I need a break, auntie.” Kubo gasped, leaning back. “Or I might _die_.” It’s not much of an exaggeration. All his muscles hurt, after being thrown to the ground over and over again. Sword practice had been much more fun when he was little and it was his mother teaching him. They’d chase each other around the fire with sticks and she would tickle him when she found a weak point. Karasu was not nearly as playful.

There was a gust of wind and his aunt’s cape brushed his hand. He braced for an attack, but she sat down instead, the gravel crunching as she knelt.

Kubo let his guard down, just a little, and flopped back. It wasn’t the most comfortable place to lay but at the moment he didn’t care.

“Your weakness is a disgrace to this realm.” Karasu said, with something between hate and affection. A cold line traced down his forehead.

“Auntie,” Kubo asked, and already dreaded the answer, “Do you love me?”

Her voice echoed prettily, light and careless and just a little hurt. “Did your mother?”

“Of course she did!” Kubo said, offended, and memories hit him like the peal of a bell. His mother’s smile, her eyes as he’d told her stories. Brushing her hair and picking out the streaks of grey in it.

Karasu could smile even when she was being awful. It was a talent he did not envy. “If she did, then I must. You are all that is left of her, and you have her blood. Her magic. How could I not love my only nephew?”

“You have a really weird way of showing it.” Kubo told her. “You’re so mean, and you want me to be someone else, and you make fun of me whenever I do anything. Mother was never like this.”

Feathers rustled, and teeth clicked from behind her mask. “Oh, little boy, you would be surprised by what your mother once was.”

“She was kind,” Kubo said and dared her to contradict him, “She told me stories, about everything. About…” Something clicked into place in the pit of his stomach. He could not remember, but you didn’t have to remember the details to be certain of something. Some knowledge bypassed the mind entirely, and rested steadily in your bones.

“She used to tell me stories about my father,” Kubo whispered, “And she was so smart and brave and beautiful. And now I barely have any stories to tell about her. What was she like, when you knew her, auntie?”

There was a silence as weighty as silk, layered thick and pressing down on everything. Karasu exhaled and the air whistled around the edges of her mask.

“Out of all the stars in the heavens, she shone the brightest. We could never hope to match her.” Wistfulness stained her voice, and pain.

It did not quite sound like love to Kubo, but it was closer than anything else he had known in the Moon Kingdom, and besides, who was he to judge? He didn’t really have a large sample size to compare it against.

“Was she kind?” he asked.

Karasu laughed, “Don’t be ridiculous. She was beautiful, and powerful. The perfect daughter, and the perfect sister. You have not seen all the glory of the heavens yet, confined as you are to this fragile body,” she poked him in the side, “But there is so much more than sentiment to the cosmos. She could dance among the twining of galaxies and hold ribbons of light between her hands.”

“She used to cut my hair,” Kubo countered. “We had a little knife, and she would sit by the fire, comb it out, and then cut it section by section. It always came out choppy.”

“She could make castles out of paper, and turn leaves of gold into ships that sailed the Milky Way.” Karasu told him irately. “She could best any warrior, and out play everyone except for Grandfather.”

Kubo took this in, and added, “She liked fish with ginger.”

“Impossible,” Karasu scoffed.

Kubo shrugged. “I might not remember much, but I remember that.”

“He ruined her,” his aunt fumed, “He took my sister and and turned her into something weak, into something human. That _insect_.” The sheer rage in her voice was enough to make Kubo stir.

“My father?” he asked, and tried not to let his eagerness show.

“He was a fool,” Karasu told him, “A fool to even think of challenging the might of heaven, and a fool to look twice at our sister. He should have died when he had the chance.”

“If he had,” Kubo pointed out, “I wouldn’t even have been born. None of this would have happened.” Unfortunately, he suspects his aunts could live with that possibility. He cannot fill the place his mother left.

“Maybe your mother would have made you,” Karasu mercifully allowed. “She had the power to give life, she could have given it to you without that miserable human man’s help. Then we could all be a family, here. Together.”

Kubo shook his head. “That wouldn’t be me. We’re all made up of stories, that’s what my mother always said. Without the stories… it would be someone else who just looks like me.”

“You are as mawkish as your mother was,” Karasu sighed, dismissive. “It is a disgrace that you are all that’s left of her memory.” Her hand ghosted through his hair again, ruffling the bangs that always fell out of what tried to be a neat topknot.

“I love you too, Aunt Karasu,” Kubo said reflexively, and leaned into her touch. He knew it probably wasn’t smart to love someone who hated you on principle, but he couldn’t help it. His mother had warned him against his family all his life, but now they were all he had left.

“Love was what that Hanzo offered my sister. Love was what took her soul,” Karasu retorted, too fast and too angry to filter her words through the veil of common sense.

Kubo’s heart skipped a beat. “Hanzo? His name was Hanzo?”

 _Hanzo_ . He tried to sear it into his brain, so he would never forget again. He wasn’t sure how exactly you went about not forgetting, but he wanted to learn.  
  
_Hanzo_. It sounded right, like something he had always known deep in his heart.

The pause as Karasu regathered her dignity was almost sullen. “You should not care. He was a human, and he does not matter here. A name, a face, it’s of no account. The man who stole my sister died screaming, and everything he made faded years ago. Everything but you, and you, precious nephew, are no true child of his. The blood of heaven overwrites the petty lineages of the mortal world. I have seen the many things, but I have never seen pure magic overruled by filth of the earth.”

Despite all her vitriol, Kubo was still going to count that as a victory. He knew his father’s name.

“Where’s Aunt Yukami?” he inquired, changing the subject while he was still ahead, and before Karasu could decide to do anything awful. “I haven’t seen her much lately.”

That was an understatement. He hadn’t seen her at all, and she was almost definitely ignoring her, but Karasu didn’t know he knew that, probably.

“Doing Grandfather’s will,” Karasu said shortly. “We do have matters other than you to attend to.”

“It’s just strange,” Kubo said, pushing himself up off the ground, so he was sitting instead of laying down. His muscles all hurt from exertion. Perfectly identical pieces of gravel fell out of his hair and didn’t stick to his clothes. “You two aren’t usually apart. You’re sisters. Sisters should stick together.”

 _“If we did, you wouldn’t have been born_.” she mimicked, and laughed. “Besides, someone must keep an eye on our wayward nephew. We can’t have you spying on people again, can we?”

Kubo saw an opening, and took it. “You don’t have to be the one to watch me though. I could stay with someone else. There are lots of people around. I could go and sit with Grandfather, or listen to poetry. The lady in the pavilion, the one with the koto, asked if I could play a duet with her. I could go do that,” he said innocently. “I hate to be a burden, auntie.”

The clink of chain made him think that she was playing with her kusarigama. It was something she did when she was thoughtful. “And abandon my sister’s only child? No, I could not shame our family so. Not when there is so much to the art of combat for you to learn.”

Kubo winced, and grabbed for her hands, careful not to accidentally cut himself on the weapon no doubt close to them. They felt like the hands of a corpse, but he’d grown used to the bloodlessness of his relatives. “Pleeeeease. It’s been so long since I’ve had a chance to play. Grandfather doesn’t want to see me anymore, and I can’t learn about swords forever. It’s not even fun anymore. Besides, you deserve some time to yourself.”

“Your music is important,” Karasu allowed, “Grandfather does so enjoy your playing. I wouldn’t want to let you get out of practice.”

The lady with the koto had answers, he knew it. And unlike his aunts, she actually seemed to like talking to him. Kubo wanted to see her again desperately.

“If you left me with her, you could go find your sister,” he pointed out. “Then we’d both be happy. I don’t like seeing you upset, and I know I can be difficult to be around.” His mere existence seemed to disgust her, after all. Difficult was the least of it.

“You are my sister’s child,” Karasu said, folding his hand between hers. “You are all that is left of her, and so I love you.” She actually seemed to mean it this time, in her own, distorted way. “We’ll fetch your shamisen.”

Kubo smiled, and hugged her. “Thank you!”

It was curious how love twisted to fit into odd spaces, how it stretched thin as thread in the rarified atmosphere of the moon and moved mountains all the same. His mother had lived her for eons, and still been so warm. His father, Hanzo, had softened the heart of someone like his aunts. Surely, he could do it too, just for a little while. In a way it was comforting, to know that in a few ears he'd be like them and wouldn't have to struggle to fit in anymore, but it also made him all the more determined to use the time he had. 

  
  
  
  


* * *

  
  
  
  
  


“It’s shaped like a skull,” Beetle says, stating the obvious. “That’s not a good sign.”

It had taken them almost an hour to find the place, hidden as it was behind a wall, tucked away next to a waterfall that thundered down into the Long Lake. No one wanted to see a giant skull when they crashed through a wall.

“No,” Sariatu agrees, “but a quest is not meant to be simple.” It even has pointed fangs, she notices. Definitely not a good sign. A faint memory of a monster with a skull motif stirs in the back of her mind but dozes back off before she can get a grip on it.

Beetle nods quickly, “I know that. You have my fealty for life. I would jump off a cliff, if you ordered it. You know, depending on the circumstances. But, uh,” he hesitated, “are you sure you want to come along? It could be dangerous, and I’m sure the indubitably talented Monkey and I could handle it ourselves-”

Sariatu cut him off with a quick motion. “No, you’ll need me. Besides, this is my quest to undertake.” She slings her shamisen around to her front, so it is close at hand, and checks that her hair is firmly tied behind her.

It has been a long time since she has faced battle, and try as she might, she can’t stop the doubts creeping up her spine. The back of her neck prickles with unease, and anticipation that has lurked in her for years. She’d forgotten what it felt like to be on the edge of action, teetering at the brink of desperate movement and the flying thrill of the fight.

“As you wish,” Beetle agrees, and eyes the skull with the same nervous energy Sariatu feels thrumming through her fingers. “So, do we just walk in?”

Monkey considers the situation then leaps forward agilely. She reaches the face of the skull in a few bounds, and peers inside its open maw. A thoughtful chatter, and she draws back. Beetle scampers over to join her.  
  
“What is it, Monkey? Is someone stuck down a well?” he asks idly, as he examines the smooth stone teeth. Not-Hanzo (Sariatu can’t help the name sticking in her mind, but she also can’t call it that, not yet) high fives him.

Monkey bares her fangs, just as one of the fangs comes off in Beetle’s hands.

“I can fix it,” he claims, but is silenced by a rumble. It’s not a good rumble. It is, frankly, an ominous rumble.

Monkey returns to Sariatu’s side like lightening, and Beetle joins them. Monkey and Beetle are both trying to throw their arms out to shield her from any threat emerging from the cave, but they end up hitting each other in the process. It’s a sweet gesture, that Sariatu really doesn’t have time for at the moment. The rumble grows louder.

She realizes that it is coming from the ground beneath them, an instant before it gives way under their feet.

The fall is not long, but it is not insignificant either. Her robes fall loose and flutter around her. Monkey grabs onto one of her flying sleeves, and Beetle gets caught in the whirl of her train.

They hit the ground together, and her shamisen twangs unhappily at the impact. Hair and aged silk both serve as something of a cushion but the landing still knocks her breath away. She takes a second to regain it then presses her hands flat against the dusty green surface of the floor and sits up.

Her head is whirling, but that’s nothing new. Beetle groans, which means he’s probably alive.

“Monkey?” she asks, and her voice sound faint even to her. “Monkey?” She leans forward and gently shakes the white furred lump in front of her.

Monkey hisses, then scrambles to her feet. Beetle is still straining to get up, at least until Sariatu pulls her train out from under him, flipping him back onto his stomach in the process.

“Many thanks, lovely lady,” Beetle acknowledges. He’s louder than she is, and his voice echoes around the hall. “Where are we?”

“Underground,” Sariatu whispers back, staring at the ceiling they fell from. A very long way away, she can see sunlight.

They don’t need it, it turns out. The cavern- no, more than a cavern, the _room_ \- seems to glow from the inside out. The walls are translucent green, like a gemstone or flawless glass. There are stairs in front of her, leading up and up, and behind her is…

A plinth of the same material as the walls, and floating above it, a giant skeletal hand. Pedestal and bones are both lit from below, and the warm, golden light glints off the sword embedded in the palm of the hand.

Beetle had been talking behind her, too fast for her to comprehend. He stops when he notices the main event.

“Is that it?” he steps closer, kicking aside rocks that accompanied their fall. There are some bones scattered among them, she notices, and more piled in the corners. Monkey lopes over to examine some.

Bones. The back of her mind rattles with empty facts. Her subconscious is gesturing wildly at her, she simply can’t figure out why.

Beetle coughs. “I said, is that it?”

“Presumably,” Sariatu stares at the sword, as if she can somehow divine its true nature simply by looking. (In truth, she’d need to touch it at least once to feel the heavenly power coursing through it. Her abilities are still limited.) “I’m worried it’s a trap.”

“Ah, I see. Let me take care of it then.” He seems earnest in the offer, and Sariatu’s lips quirk into a smile. It’s mirthless, they are too close to danger for her to truly laugh, and besides, he’s too _ridiculous_.

Monkey comes back with a shin bone in hand and Sariatu tries not to giggle. “It is still a trap, regardless of who springs it,” she warns, still trying to find a balance between thoughtlessness and too much thought.

“I’m a professional, ma’am.” He plucks little Hanzo off his shoulder and deposits him on Monkey’s head, to Monkey’s visible dismay. Then he skitters forward on all… sixes, perches on the outstretched fingertips of the fleshless, disembodied, eerily floating hand.

Adding an insect to the image is somehow not reassuring. Sariatu is almost certain the green glow is growing stronger.

Just as Beetle is about to pounce forward, she raises a hand. “Wait! We should do this together.”

“Really?”

She joins him on the dais, and after a second Monkey joins her. “Yes. If it’s a trap, we want to trigger it as a group, don’t we?” She sounds more uncertain than she’d like to but Beetle seems won over.

They pull the sword out together, in one smooth motion.

“It’s not the one,” Sariatu breaths, at the same moment that Beetle crows their victory. The rumble of a trap being sprung is almost a foregone conclusion. Monkey pulls them both to safety and they watch as the bones float up into the shadows of the ceiling, coalescing into something bigger.

Eyes like bonfires stare balefully down at them for a moment. Beetle has an arrow nocked, and her grip tightens instinctively around the sword though she knows it is a fake.

“How do you want to do this then?” Beetle asks, his voice cavalier even in terror.

“I… don’t know,” Sariatu admits.

Beetle tears his eyes away from the hungry bones above them and gives what she thinks is meant to be an encouraging smile. “Don’t think, just feel,” he suggests, “you can do this.”

The monster guardian bends to meet them, and she sees the glimmer of metal embedded in his skull. “There! We’ll distract it, Monkey, find the sword!”

 

 

They battle. Long forgotten glory uncoils within her, instinct honed by centuries of battle coming out again. The mind can forget, the body does not.

They win (barely).

That really is the least of it.

  


* * *

  
  
  


There was a reason they called it “playing” music. It was always a game. It was much more fun with the Lady than it was with Grandfather. Try as he might, Kubo still make mistakes. A slip of the finger here, a badly strummed note there. Flaws that did not matter became glaring under Grandfather’s heavenly light.

The Lady paused, wondering, every time he messed up, but did not comment. They were playing in turns, then as they grew more confident, layering melodies on top of each other, like folding dough in on itself. They went faster and faster, each repetition adding new nuances to the song, elaborations on a theme. She had fretted her koto low, to make a good counterpoint to the higher notes of the shamisen, and she played so skillfully that Kubo wanted to laugh out of sheer delight.

When his fingers started to tire, she graciously put an end to the music and they sat back, letting the last hums die on their strings.

“That was beautiful,” Kubo said eventually. “How can you play so well? I’ve been playing all my life, and that’s with only three strings!”

“Perfection is a gift and a virtue,” the Lady agreed, “But so is imperfection. You know, down there,” she lowered her voice so Kubo knew exactly what _where_ she was referring to, “they say that a thing is only beautiful if it fades.”

“How do you know that?” he asked, fascinated.

She plucked a single string, then two, and let the reverberations die out before she answered. “I hear stories, I listen. There is gossip even here, little prince, though the Moon King does not find it agreeable.”

Kubo shuffled a little closer to her until his knees were on her flowing robes. They could not be too careful. Auntie Karasu had left them, had gone to find her sister, but she was frightening quiet when she wanted to be and she knew Kubo was up to _something_.

“Could you tell them to me?” he pleaded, trying to make his voice a rustle rather than a sound. “Please, I want to know, I need to know.”

“I could tell you dozens of stories, little prince,” the Lady said mournfully, “but they would not be your story. I am afraid even I do not know how to find that when it’s lost.”

She sounded heartbroken, and Kubo knew quite suddenly how something sad could be beautiful. Beautiful though it was, he didn’t like it. She was too nice to be desolated. It wasn’t fair.

“I know bits and pieces,” he said, keeping his voice positive, “Sometimes I remember things. And just this morning, Auntie Karasu told me my father’s name is- mmmph!”

A hand- cool to the touch and thin fingered, much like his aunts’ hands but just a smidgen different- muffled him. “It would be wisest not to say a name like that,” the Lady warning him, vice trembling, “For your Grandfather has powers beyond your ken.”

Kubo nodded, and the hand was removed. He repeated the name a few times to himself, just to make sure he remembered it, then forged onwards.

“But the point is, I know it. I know other things too, and I can learn more. I have to. My family took my eyes, and I don’t mind that, really. They just wanted me to come live with them. But they took me away from my mother, and that I do mind. I just want to be able to remember what it was all like. If I am to live her forever and ever I can at least have that.”

He gulped down air after he finished his sentence, and waited for her reply. She did not rush into anything hastily. Being hasty simply wasn’t tolerated here, except from him and sometimes his aunties.

“You say you can remember things from your life on earth?” she said, still tremulous, like she couldn’t quite believe it.

Kubo tossed the ends of his sleeves back, so his hands could feel the fresh air. “I remember my mother, mostly. The rest of it is just… feelings. Tastes, sometimes smells, noises I hear in the back of my head, or see in dreams- even though I don’t really dream anymore. I’ll think of something, and then not know why, or I’ll make a joke I don’t understand. There are songs I know how to play that come as naturally to me as breathing, but I don’t know where I learned them. There are memories with holes in them, but I can see the shapes of the holes and guess what was once there. It’s no fun, not knowing why you miss something but still missing it all the same.”

“No, it isn’t, is it?”

“Did you forget something too?” Kubo asked, “Did they steal your memories as well?”

“Hmm,” the Lady sighed, and he heard a smile creep into her voice. “Do you know what?”

“What?”

“I really can’t remember.”

“What a coincidence,” Kubo cried, throwing up his hands, “I don’t remember either!” Anger and frustration made his voice too loud, his gesture too wild. The Lady made a shushing noise, like he was a fussing baby or a morning bird up too early.

“Sorry,” Kubo said bashfully, ‘It’s just kind of frustrating. A lot frustrating, really. Does this mean you’ll help me?”

“I…” the Lady dithered for a moment, then sighed, “Child, I cannot help but try. I will tell you what stories I can remember, tell you what I have heard, but I am not sure it will be enough to open your eyes.”

“Don’t worry,” Kubo said cheerfully. “My eyes aren’t even in my head, so I can’t close them.”

She gasped, so deeply that Kubo wondered if she was made of air rather than flesh and… celestial being stuff. “Your eyes. They may be the key. You said they were taken from you so you could come and dwell among us?”

“That’s what my aunts tell me,” Kubo affirmed.

“And even though your memories are gone, they are still strong. You have human blood,” she whispered, “You were not made to forget as we were. You are not a static creature. You change everyday, it’s frightening.”

“My aunts tell me that too,” he added.

“It must have taken strong magic to take your memory away from you, to make you like us even for a while. Perhaps, if you take back what was stolen from you, you will find your memories along with it.”

Kubo’s hands crept automatically to his face and his blindfold. “You mean, get my eyes back? Where would they be? Would they even still be good? Pieces of humans that you chop off don’t last that long, I’m almost _certain_ I remember that.”

There was a shiver of silk as the Lady leaned into him. He could feel her cool breath on his cheek. She smelled like flower petals on the wind. “Your grandfather would not have destroyed them. They hold a piece of you, and your memories if I’m not mistaken. There is power there and the Moon King does not waste power unless he is truly angry. You can find your eyes, and perhaps reclaim your memories, unless it is too late.”

It was all dizzying, staggering, and Kubo could only concentrate on one thing. “But… I mean…”

“It may be your only hope,” the Lady confided. “A story once lost rarely comes back the way you left it.”

“Yes, but I only just got good at being blind!” Kubo wailed. His hands bunched up into fists as he tried to wait out the tears making a play for domination of his face.

“Shhhh, shhhh,” the Lady repeated, a staccato, slightly tentative attempt at comfort. “Little prince, I cannot make your choice for you. You have power, I can feel it beating in your chest. You have a chance, whatever you do. You are born of heaven and earth. I’m sorry to say it, but nothing stands in your way.”

“Lots of things stand in my way.” Kubo pointed out, wiping his face though there were no tears on it. “I can name three right now.”

“I meant it in a more poetic sense.”

“Huh.” He let himself calm down, gripped his shamisen tightly until he could think straight again. It wasn’t as good as his old one, every inch of which he knew by heart, but the feeling of the instrument was soothing. He could feel his pulse thudding against the back of the drum, beating the faintest time on the skin front. “I think- I think I want to find my memories, no matter what. Thank you, for all your help.”

“Little prince, it is I who should be thanking you.”

“Kubo,” Kubo sniffed. “You can call me Kubo. I think I’ve told you that already.”

“Kubo. Would you like to play again?” She plucked a three note entry, an invitation. Even with his mind racing Kubo couldn’t turn up a gift like that.

They played.

  
  
  
  


* * *

  
  
  


 

It isn’t really the least of it, because apparently Beetle can fly now. Sariatu chooses to be thankful rather than shocked. It gets them out of the Cavern of Bones alive and in four separate and rightful pieces.

They regroup on the beach, with the sunset lake sparkling in front of them. Sariatu grips the Sword Unbreakable like it could disappear at any minute, while Monkey tries to fix Beetle’s wing, to no avail.

After several minutes of groaning and pained hisses, she gives in. The Sword is carefully handed to Monkey, and she takes over ministrative duties. She thinks she remembers how insects work on earth, and she is probably a little better inclined towards Beetle at the moment. He didn’t step on _her_ hand during the battle.

“You were pretty good back there,” Beetle says, between muffled hissing of what she thinks aren’t real swear words. “I liked, the thing you did, with the two swords and the piece of bone? Ouch!”

“Sorry,” Sariatu says quickly, and tries to fold the thin flying wings along the veins this time, “You fought well as well. You did shoot him in the eye, after all.”

“Are we sure it’s a him?” Beetle tries to crane his neck to look at her, and fails. He doesn’t have enough flexibility in the spine region. “Giant skeleton monsters are gender neutral, after all.”

“Monkey killed him, and Monkey thinks it’s a him,” Sariatu says shortly.

Beetle looks rather offended. “What, so you -ow- speak for Monkey now? She is her own giant fuzzy hell beast, she can have her own op-OW-inions.”

Sariatu folds the wing back up and sits back on her heels, pleased. “I’ve always spoken for Monkey. Right?”

Monkey looks up from digging in the sand and gives Sariatu a decidedly amenable look.

“See, she agrees with me. Now, do you think you can close your wing back up?”

“No,” Beetle grumbles, then tries and brightens significantly. “Wait, I can. Thank you very much, my lady. What’s our next move then?”

Sariatu looks at the darkening sky. In this twilight hour she feels almost alive. “We need to get inside. Soon it will be dark, and we can’t get caught out in moonlight.”

Beetle nods, scoops up Hanzo from the sand, and shoulders his quiver. Standing up he casts quite the shadow on the lake behind them, like a monster out of a play or Sariatu’s adventures. “Of course not. Remind me why again? I got part of the story, something about your father and him stealing Kubo to the moon, but I’m not sure that’s the whole picture. If it is it’s a very weird picture.”

He bounces back fast, she has to admit. Unfortunately even in the sunset rush, she’s still too drained from the fight to give a full accounting of her life and times. “It’s weird all the time, but you do deserve to know more. I’ll tell you later. We need to get inside, now, and not into those caves.” She isn’t sure what else lurks in the skull caverns (skull shaped from all sides!) and she doesn’t want to find out. They can go further down the beach.

“Agreed,” Beetle says with a shudder, and they set off. Monkey hands Sariatu the sword back, and lightening rushes up her arm. It’s nice to have unmatchable divine power back on her side.

The comfort of the storm is marred by the fact that Beetle keeps talking. He’s antsy, Sariatu realizes, and he’s her responsibility. Hanzo took oaths seriously, he would not have let a vassal of his be so unsettled. Hanzo was good at the whole feudalism thing. Sariatu was good at being a goddess. They were similar but not identical concepts, and she didn’t want to leave Beetle stranded in the gap between.

“We need to find the second piece of armor,” she says slowly, and Beetle stops mid-conversation with little NotHanzo.

“Do you know where it is?”

A sudden wind blows Sariatu’s hair back, and nearly blows her words away from her. “I don’t,” she confesses through the gale, then has a sudden thought. “But I know the people who might. How far do you think your wings can carry us?”

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> -Ainu music has some of the strongest magic-to-music connections, so I wanted to give it at least a little nod. 
> 
> -Bad Moon Childrearing: The Series continues. His aunts are trying, really, but they're hurting a lot. They've never lost anything or gained anything before and now they're trying to cope with both in less than a decade? Not easy for an immortal. 
> 
> -Originally there were two fight scenes in this chapter, but they didn't really support the dreamier tone I was going for. Maybe a little later on in the narrative. In the meantime, enjoy fight aftermaths. 
> 
> -In the meantime, Team Amnesia gets another member. Amnesia for everyone! There is enough to go around. As was correctly guessed last chapter, the Lady is a reference to Princess Kaguya from the Tale of the Bamboo Cutter. This is her after her tragic ending, still struggling to put back together her story. The concept she describes is loosely based on that of mono no aware, the idea that a fading or finite thing is made more beautiful because it doesn't last. Quite the contrast to the aesthetics of the Moon Kingdom, where everything is made to look natural but never truly moves at all. 
> 
> -The fic has a playlist now, it's on playmoss and it is up to date with this chapter! (https://playmoss.com/en/grassyplain/playlist/knows-the-cuckoo-when-he-sings) The second to last song is the basis for what the Lady and Kubo were playing, though obviously they only have two instruments.
> 
> -Beetle wings! They have two pairs, and the flying wings are quite fragile. Fortunately Sariatu has a steady hand.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey! Thanks for waiting for this chapter, it just spun on and on. Hope you really like buildup, with any luck things will start moving again next chapter. 
> 
> Speaking of the update schedule, there will probably not be a chapter in April, so next one will probably go up in May? Very late May or June. So, hang in there, I guess. Thanks for being so supportive! You all are the best. 
> 
> Annotations are at the bottom. Lots of notable cultural or historical stuff this chapter.

Hosato pours the bitter pine needle brew with exacting patience. He’s an exacting man, careful and kind. Sariatu enjoys his company, as much as she can when there is a quest stretching out before them, crying out for attention.

Beetle is playing with the children in the village square. After a short adjustment period, the people of the Sun Village had taken to him with alarming alacrity. Now, in late autumn, the harvest is in full gear and he has made a sort of game out of the endless work of hauling bundles of grain to the small, oxen driven grindstone that sits near the river.

Sariatu vaguely remembers that this is how the seasons have always passed, that she has watched this play out before. First the late summer rice, then the autumn wheat, then the crops of winter, uncertain as they are. The cycle never stops, it cannot afford to, and the poorer farmers are forever struggling to make ends meet.

Fortunately, the village takes care of its own.

Hosato passes her the little cup of pine needle tea and blows on his own drink softly. The smooth glaze of it, fine work as befits a potter, is hot against her palms. They’d had to go an get a new tea set, Hosato had sold the last one to a woman with a clumsy son-in-law.

It’s a slow day, not many people moving through the market, all the vendors either busy with the harvest or taking a well deserved break from it. Only a handful have come over to the porch where Hosato holds his ceramic court, and most of those who have came to talk to Sariatu.

Sadly they’d had little to offer in terms of quest advice. Their memories of Kubo’s stories are even fuzzier than Sariatu’s own. The Breastplate Impenetrable might be under the sea, or in a volcano, or hidden in the palace of a river god, or far away under the bejeweled branches of the trees that grow on the eternal mountain.

She grips her cup tightly and lets the heat rush up her hands. The day is blessedly overcast, but noon will never be her best time.

Hosato is looking at her, concerned. “Is something weighing on your mind?” he asks, surveying the quiet town with her. Monkey trudges past, a bag of grain on her back and children toddling after her. She’d collected her own group of followers, pointedly separate from Hanzo’s band of disciples. Young children flock to her, and she seems to like them, in her own gruff way. Sariatu envies the ease with which she deals with them. Children have always confounded her. They move too quickly, are too mortal for her weakened mind to fully grasp. Even Kubo, her precious boy, had been a challenge. Sometimes it had felt like he was parenting her.

Steam rises in tiny whorls as she blows on her barely-tea, not because she minds the heat but because it is the human thing to do. “I’m sorry, what?” It’s too easy to forget questions once asked, or get swept up in a river of thought and lose the world to it.

“Your mind is somewhere else,” Hosato observes.

“With the Breastplate Impenetrable, if we can ever figure out where that is.” She’s discontent, and it shows.

“Your son told many stories,” he assures her, “Surely the truth lies hidden in one of them. And if it is not I am certain you will find another way. There are still many people to speak with. Word of your return will get around.”  


There are dozens of small farms scattered through the fields and little fishermen’s homes clinging to the coast. This close to winter the people are all busy preparing for the long dark, too busy to flock to the town for a story, however heroic. Even the pine trees of the forest are beginning to fortify themselves. As much as Sariatu loves the winter, when the nights are long and Kubo always stayed close to her side, she cannot deny that it is first and foremost a time of dying.

Hosato is probably right. More people will come, in a trickle as their work allows. Surely one of them will have the answer. If not she’ll have dragged them all back her for nothing.

Well, not quite for nothing. She cannot deny that it’s nice to see the town rebuilding. She’d slipped the village headman some of the gold coins she’d found in Beetle’s cave, and hopes it will be enough to help everyone, if not repay them for their boundless kindness. She wants them to be safe, because if these people have survived her sisters’ secondhand wrath than perhaps Kubo can as well. Familiar faces, however dimly remembered, remind her that not everything is lost. Humanity continues, resilient.

Hosato is watching her, and after a while it registers that his statement probably deserves some sort of response. “Yes?” she agrees uncertainly. “Yes, I hope that is true.”

He smiles bemusedly. “In the meantime, we can enjoy the sun.”

Now _that_ is a concept entirely foreign to her. Sunlight is something to be weathered, not appreciated.  
  
“How?” The words are out of her mouth before she can consider them. Hosato blinks, a little startled, then his forehead furrows like he’s never really considered it before.

The shade of the porch shelters her from the weak sunlight but he’s sitting forward, so that the faint rays pour down him and the occasional burst of brighter light that comes as the clouds move dapples his robe with shifting shadows. “You know, I’ve never thought about it. It’s just something you do.”

Sariatu creeps on hand forward, into the light, and lets it rest there for a moment. She feels nothing but the usual, uncomfortable sensation that her fragile mortal body is burning. The sun is beautiful to watch, but best from a distance. She draws her hand back. “No, it’s not for me.”

“Lots of ladies are careful about their complexions,” he offers, and leans into a passing beam of light. “Perhaps it’s an activity better enjoyed by old men like me.”

It is kind of him to pretend there isn’t another factor, aside from womanhood, that might be explain her dislike of the day.

Beetle trots down the road again, a sack of grain on each shoulder and a child clinging to his back.  Not-Hanzo is a bright red blur between his horns, safely out of the way of little hands, and pointing the way forward with his sword. This time Mari is following him as well. The hem of her skirt is wet, and half the children leave damp footprints in the packed dirt, though the reasons are as mysterious as children’s games must be. She gives her father a wave as her group trudges past, and Beetle points out the sword lying sheathed at Sariatu’s side to the children beside him. She can almost hear him telling the story of their brave battle for what might be the hundredth time. He’s forgotten most of it, and the tale grows stranger with every telling.

Among the awed cries and raucous passing of the carrying crew she almost misses the love that cover’s Hosato’s face like a veil. Unlike a veil it does not conceal anything, instead it draws his features into focus, highlighting the soft lines around his eyes, the humanity in his gaze. He speaks often of his late mother, and sometimes quietly of his wife, but he cares for his daughter most of all. Mari is his life.

 _You are my quest_ , she thinks and though she cannot quite remember the meaning of the words she knows they are important.

“She’s a wonderful girl,” Sariatu tells him.

Hosato nods, “You’re too kind,” he says, but his pride shines through the words, piercing as sunlight.

They sit.

After a while the old woman on the other end of the square wakes up from her nap and ambles over to them. Hosato obligingly makes a place for her, though her clothes are rough and faded and he is one of the more prosperous men in town. Age demands respect.

“I see you’re still hogging our guest of honour,” the old woman says and grins toothlessly.

Hosato sighs. “Would you like something to drink?” he offers, hand hovering over the kettle between them.

She waves him away, “Please, don’t trouble yourself. This old woman doesn’t need anything fancy.” With a click of her tongue she turns to Sariatu, “Your friend is being quite the help. Strong man, isn’t he? Or not a man, I should say.”

“He’s enthusiastic,” Sariatu acknowledges. “I wish I could do more to help as well.”

The old lady pats her knee sympathetically. “Later everyone will come back to town for dinner and you can play us a song. We’ve missed the music, with Kubo gone.”  


The Sword Unbreakable suddenly feels very heavy at her side. “You knew him well, didn’t you?” Sariatu says, though the words feel heavy in her mouth. “I think you said so, earlier.”

It has been a long day. Lots of people have said lots of things to her since her little group arrived early this morning, but she’s almost certain she’s spoken to the old woman before.

“He was always such a good boy,” the little old lady admits mournfully. She hunches over a little more, as if grief itself weighs on her shoulders, “So sweet and handsome. Always willing to listen, always willing to help. We all liked him. And his stories! They brought a real light into our lives. Distracted everyone from their work, of course,” she smiled wryly, “But it was worth it to see a little magic and hear something beautiful.”

Hosato shifts uncomfortably. He doesn’t like awkward silences and situations he cannot fix, Sariatu knows. Much like broken pottery, it upsets him.

“I am sure he will be found, in time.”

“Oh, there’s no denying that,” the woman gives Sariatu a speculative look. “He’ll show up. He has all the makings of something powerful. A childhood in exile, royal blood. That’s something for the songs, isn’t it? The only question is how he’ll use it.”

“Kameyo, please,” Hosato chides. “This poor woman has travelled so far, she is tired. Don’t trouble her with fairytales.”

Sariatu takes a sip of her cooled tea and grimaces. It’s positively anti-septic. “It’s fine,” she insists. “I know everyone is very worried about him, and I appreciate the concern, but I am certain he can be brought home safely.” The platitude is tried but true. No matter what the story says, she will change it. She cannot remember the right words, but she knows the melody and she has to trust it ends with her child back in her arms.

Old Kameyo nods. “That sounds about right-” she begins to agree, but is cut off by the appearance of a burly man in blue, jogging up the central street of the village and shouting.

“Hashi!” Hosato calls back, standing abruptly. “Is something wrong?”

The one named Hashi slides to a halt in front of the potter’s home and pauses to catch his breath. “Damned… grind-stone… jammed up again. We need more men to help lift it. Is that the sword?” He’s quickly distracted by the weapon next to Sariatu. It is nondescript, but somehow catches the eye.

She nods, because there is not much else to say. Hashi has the look of someone who has never held a sword in life, but rather likes the idea of it. Sometimes, she’s found, humans can be rather ridiculous when it comes to weaponry.

“The grindstone,” Hosato reminds him, and he tears his eyes away from it.

Fortunately Hashi is easily distracted. “Right. I don’t want to drag anyone away from the fields but Jirou and Hitoshi are usually around this time of day.”

Kameyo cackles and takes on the expression of someone making an old joke. “Are you sure you can’t lift it up yourself, Hashi? A big strong man like you should be able to do that much.”  


Hashi puffs out his chest, obligingly playing along with the joke, Sariatu hopes. “Of course I could, but I need someone else to clear the jam. And it’s best not to startle the oxen.”

It’s some long worn game she isn’t in on, and even Hosato chuckles. “I will help, so as not to upset them,” he agrees, and looks at Sariatu. “Would you mind watching the shop?”

“Yes,” she says. She can watch. It’s people trying to buy things that might prove troublesome.

The men are gone before she can process it, time moving too slowly for her again. Now she and Kameyo are together on the porch and silence reigns with an iron fist. Monkey passes by them again, with a toddler around her neck and dragging on the ground and she moves. There is giggling, and it’s probably not Monkey doing it. Sariatu finishes her tea, and the aftertaste lingers in her mouth. Taste is still strange, and sometimes overwhelming. There is so much of it.

Kameyo overthrows the quiet in a sudden revolution of gummy sound. “So,” she says, smacking her lips, “You’re staying with Hosato again?”

“He offered,” Sariatu informs her carefully. “He is... very kind. You all are.”

“Your beetle man with you?”

Sariatu pulls her shamisen in front of her and fingers the frets, just to have something to do with her hands. “Mari doesn’t seem to mind him, so yes, I would say so.”

She chewed on that one for a while, thoughtfully. “Huh. Just mind yourself. He’s a widower and people will talk. Rumours spread like wildfire around here. Everyone likes you a lot, and we all love Kubo, but a bit of scandal can turn even sensible young people’s brains to mush.”

“But not yours, I’m sure, grandmother.” Sariatu says solemnly.

The old woman looks at her for another long while. “I reckon you’re a lot older than me, young lady.”

She’s not wrong.

“Just try to keep from starting anything you can’t control,” Kameyo advises. “Hosato is a good man, and Kubo is the sweetest boy, and you seem to be alright for a magical woman from the moon. You already have a quest, you don’t need a complication.” Again, she’s more right than she realizes. No one here needs a complication, but Sariatu has come back to them nevertheless.

“If I loved another man,” she says slowly, “It would almost certainly be a death sentence for him. My family is merciless. I would not wish that on Hosato, even if we weren’t friends.” She caves under Kameyo’s stare. “We’ll sleep on the porch.”

“There you go.” Kameyo gives her another toothless grin. “I think I heard Mitsu and her kids coming in. Her wife must have finished another batch of dyeing. They always make a clatter, and I’m sure they’ll want to talk to you. Might even have something useful to say, her boys always got along with Kubo. Want some help talking to them?”

The idea of that many people is overwhelming, especially now when the sun has barely begun to dip in the sky but has encroached on what was previously her shelter of shade. “Please,” Sariatu says. They are all so generous it aches. Kameyo pats her hand again, as if she can sense her doubt.

“It’ll all work out, dear, and we’ll have a song at the end. And maybe a story, if you’re up to it.”

“I never could end them right,” Sariatu warns her. The sound of people draws closer and if she cranes her head she can see them coming down the road from the fields.

“Neither could he,” Kameyo says wistfully. Her grip is firm on Sariatu wrist, a welcome grounding in the oncoming storm. “He did add a fire breathing chicken though, and that’s all an old lady can ask for.”

Sariatu purses her lips and surveys the village, rebuilding but still flimsy and so very old. “I’m not sure you could survive a fire breathing chicken.”

Kameyo shrugs. “Die laughing, that’s what I always said.”

It is a human kind of joke, bold and morbid all at once. It would send her sisters into a tailspin. Hanzo’s cheerful acceptance of his own mortality confused her for the first months of their courtship. Now, with the sun on her face, Sariatu laughs.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


There was something almost meditative about paper folding. He could make worlds of strange, sharp angles and smooth planes, as uncanny as the moon kingdom was.

His origami seemed to upset grandfather for some reason, and Kubo didn’t get his hands on paper nearly as much as he would have liked. But his wakeup call, Yori the samurai, had mysteriously disappeared and Kubo needed to make his replacement.

Karasu had grudgingly found him some paper, and left him to his work after informing him that someone would be watching his door. Yoriji, second Yori, was coming along nicely, Kubo thought. It would have been easier with his shamisen, but he needed to practice folding by hand anyway. It was hard to judge the exact placement of folds and proportions without his eyes but he was learning fast.

There was the faintest whisper as the door slid open. Kubo shoved the mostly finished figurine up his sleeve as he smelled smoke. He could complete it later, when he had an instrument at hand to channel magic through.  


“Aunt Yukami,” he said, cautiously. He hadn’t seen her in a while.

“What are you doing?” she demanded. There wasn’t a footstep on the floorboards to warn him of her whereabouts. Sometimes he thought she floated just to confuse him.

He held up one of his test pieces, a lopsided frog, by way of explanation.

Yukami alight on the ground without a sound, but Kubo could feel it through the floor, muffled by the perfection of the place but still there. “How peculiar, I could have sworn Karasu was meant to be watching you.”

Kubo turned back to his rapidly thinning pile of paper. “Well, now you’re here, so you can watch me. Which is good, because I need to find my shamisen.”

She tapped her pipe, thoughtfully, and the smell of acrid smoke and magic grew stronger. “Why on earth would you need that?” she asked, but Kubo could tell her patience was growing thin.

“I, uh, wanted to practice,” he said quickly. A tiger joined the stack of finished origami in front of him. His hands moved quickly, pinching and drawing together and pulling back until life seemed to come forth under his fingers. “I’ve been playing a lot with a friend.”

Yukami’s tone grew tighter still. “Yes, I’ve heard.” Maybe she and Karasu were speaking after all. Kubo wasn’t really sure what was going on with them, and he didn’t feel like asking. He’d spent most his time trying to surreptitiously search every room he was in, with mixed results. Nothing especially eyeball-like had revealed itself, but there were infinite place he hadn’t checked. “Why are you so antsy, little boy?”

Honesty was the best policy, wasn’t it? Kubo didn’t want to lie anymore than he had to. This was his family, for better or for worse. “I just really love music, auntie,” he told her. “Also I’m afraid you might hate me.”

“That doesn’t mean you need to play every hour of the day,” Yukami said, ignoring the second half of his statement with perfect willful blindness. Even the people who could see sometimes chose to ignore it, when it was inconvenient or unfashionable. It made Kubo want to scream.

Instead he chose his words carefully, and played the game in front of him. He was so much more patient than when he first woke up here.

“How do you know that? You don’t play music.”

Air rushed around him and something oily and hot brushed against his hand. Yukami’s smoke was always a sure sign that she was upset. Kubo flicked away the tendrils trying to climb up him and set his chin, not backing down from his words even though he had no idea why they upset his aunt so much.

Her voice was high pitched behind her mask. “Do not think you know so much about me. You are a child. You know nothing.”

Kubo hesitated. “Do you play music then?” he asked.

Karasu and Yukami were twins, and they sounded the same in their sorrow but Kubo thought he knew the cadence to their voice from even further back. His mother’s breathy eulogies, and heavy hearted stories reverberated in his head.

“Grandfather would not have children who could not,” she said, and left it at that.

Kubo refused to let the matter drop. This was game changing. This was the closest she’d ever been to seeming anything like his mother. He struggled to his feet, weighed down by heavy regalia but buoyed by the lightness of the moon. “You did? And Aunt Karasu too? What did you play? Why… why don’t you anymore?”

She caught him as he, well, _blindly_ stumbled forward. Feathers and metal and stiff cotton passed under his hands, and her arms were like claws digging into his arms, tight and tighter and tighter.

Then the moment is gone, and she let him go, but did not back away or leave him. “What goes with a shamisen?” she asked him, and laughed lightly. “Your humans got a few things right.”

“A… biwa?” Kubo guessed, uncertainly. “No, something else.” A thought stuck him suddenly,  along with the smell of smoke and the click of his aunt’s pipe against her mask. “A flute. You played the flute.”

She did not answer him and he knew he got it right. It’s a common instrument, easily learned and easily played and a good counterpoint to strings. It made sense. He still couldn’t imagine Yukami and music going together.

“And Karasu?” he persisted.  
  
There was a shrug of feathers. “Why have a trio of daughters if they cannot be a trio of musicians too? But once the three are broken, there’s really no salvaging it, is there?” Nothing but questions, blow for blow, like she wass trying to distract him, trying to avoid saying anything straight away.

His mother broke it, ruined the spell and twisted the music. Again, the idea seemed impossible. He found himself grabbing at Yukami’s cloak once more for comfort, though he wasn’t sure if he was trying to console himself or her.

“I need to go.”

No, no, that wouldn’t do. He had no chance of finding his eyes or answers alone in his room, no chance of doing anything but dying of boredom. He needed someone else, he needed to get out. Solitude was suffocating. “No, wait, I want to come with you! Please. And- and you should play with us sometime. I can have my new shamisen, that makes three again.”

She brushed him aside forcefully, angry now rather than merely upset at a distance. “You cannot hope to replace her. We are eternal, we are unchanging! Once we are broken, we cannot heal.” Her rage came from a loftier place than Karasu’s. It seemed brittler, all hard edges and spite.

Kubo folded his arms around himself, tried not to be shaken by the gale. “I don’t want to replace anyone!” he insisted. “I just want… I want a real family. I want things to make sense. I’m sorry you’re upset, and I’m sorry Karasu’s upset and I’m sorry no one wants me, but I’m here, and you have to put up with it. I won’t talk about my mother if you don’t want me too, but I can’t stop existing either, and I need to know things, I need to do things. You can’t put me in a box and forget about me, that’s not how people work.”

In the frosty silence he could hear his breath, and it sounded too jagged to be just air. Finally Yukami spoke.

“That _is_ how we work.”

“Not me,” Kubo told her, “Not yet. Not my mother either.” He remembered how Karasu’s crossness had softened into memory when she talked about his mother. His aunts werenot always alike, but they share so much. Perhaps they could share this. “I miss her as much as you do, you know. Almost as much. A lot. And you’re right, I don’t know much about you, or what she was like when she lived here. But I want to know. I want to fit in, but you have to show me. You can’t just expect me to know how to be something I’m not.”

A step back, the sensation of someone watching him, considering. “You belong here,” Yukami repeated, but the words sounded flat, like she couldn’t quite believe it either. “Grandfather wants you to be here.” Again, a slight edge of disbelief. Kubo wondered how far Grandfather’s patience with him still stretches.

“Even birds have to learn how to fly,” Kubo said. “I’m pretty sure I remember that.”

“We did not,” she replied, archly.

They probably didn’t. He could vaguely imagine them together, beautiful and perfect and never, ever young or scared. It must have been wonderful to live here without any of the doubt or second guessing.

“What were you like, before mother left? Was it different here, was it better?” No matter how hard he tried, he still can’t make his mother and his aunts fit together, cannot imagine his mother in this sterile place with them, somehow completing them.

For a second he thought Yukami is just going to leave him, just walk out the door and go.

“It was glorious,” she said instead. “Your mother was as lofty as a goddess. Everything she did, she did perfectly. Enemies fell before her, she carried grace with her as she walked. We adored her. We wanted to be like her, we _were_ like her.”

Kubo tugged at the sleeve of his robe, far finer that his aunts’ sensible garb and flat, carved masks. Karasu had let him try hers on once, mostly to get him to stop bugging her, and it had been like wearing a death mask, waken under his touch and heavy against his face, and too long for him to wear properly. “Like, all fancy?”

“All fancy,” she confirmed, a hint of good humor back in her demeanor. Or, maybe not _good_ humour, but some levity was there, however dark. “Not as much as her, of course. The younger children should not outshine the elder. There should be order in all things. She was a crane and we were crows, but it didn’t matter because no creature of the earth could hope to match us.”

“It sounds wonderful,” Kubo lies. It doesn’t. It sounded bizarre, like some nightmare half remembered or a world far from the one he knows.

Yukami laughs, “Then she went and ruined it, tore our world to pieces and left us with you. I know my little sister hopes you can be like her someday. She is only a heartbeat younger that I, but she is foolish all the same.”

Kubo scowled. He agreed with her but didn’t want to, and the ensuing emotional struggle just left him frustrated. “Is Grandfather foolish too?”  


“You shouldn’t talk like that,” Yukami scolded, but did not move forward to tug his hair or pinch his cheek, so he knew he did not quite mean it.

“Like you’re always saying, I’m just a child,” Kubo reminded her. “I don’t know anything unless you show me. Also, right now I’m bored. I want to do something.”

“And what should I do about this?” Yukami sounded almost as lost as he did, and he was surprised she hadn’t left yet. On the other hand, they were supposed to be watching him, and he had no idea where Karasu was.

An opening like that could not be wasted. He mustered up all his cunning and guile. “You should show me around. I still don’t know where I’m going half the time, or what’s happening or what I’m supposed to be doing. I don’t know anything. I would like to stop walking into ceremonies or rooms I’m not supposed to be in or places I don’t know about.”

He held his breath as he waited for the answer. Yoriji crinkled in his sleeve.

“Very well. If it will keep you quiet.”

Kubo smiled, more to himself than her. Still, as they left his room  (then came back so he could make excuses and fumble around and surreptitiously tuck Yoriji into his pillows) he couldn’t shake the memory of her words.

 _It was glorious_.

He knew his mother as gentle and elegant and soft-spoken, always a story at hand or a hurried admonishment to stay away from the night. He knew her as shaking and fragile and very, very sad.

She was wonderful as well, with eyes that could look clear into his heart and so much worry and love. Still, she hadn’t exactly been glorious. Something had left her long ago.

He wondered if she could have loved him and been divine as well. He wasn’t sure he wanted that, but he wanted to know.

He wanted to know so very much.

He followed his aunt down the gilded halls and he listened.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


By early evening the town is alive again, voices filling the square and business hurriedly being carried out before it got dark and their tired bodies gave out. The harvest pulls in almost everyone and bits of chaff stick to clothing, wheat stalks litter the ground. The smells of dirt and sun dried grass are heavy on the air.

Sariatu is mobbed, people have so much to say, advice to give and stories to tell, and she finds herself repeating the tale of her encounter with Beetle and their battle with the skeleton half a dozen times. Details keep getting lost in the telling, her mind wandering and little bits being forgotten. Beetle tries to help, but he’s just as bad as she is. Names and relationships and introductions and explanations swim past her, as she stumbles through her story.

In the middle of explaining to yet another group of farm wives and burly fishermen that the Sword Unbreakable is powerful, yes, but she’d rather not bring it out right now and demonstrate that, Beetle shoulders through the crowd.

“Excuse me, pardon me,” he says, flashing a lopsided smile. “Can I borrow the sword?”

Through the press of people she can see the blue man, Hashi, she remembers, and a few other enthusiastic looking men and women with powerful muscles clustered together. She suspects something terrible has been born when she wasn’t watching. Perhaps letting Beetle and Hashi meet wasn’t the best idea.

Everyone else comes to the same conclusion. There are whispers. Hosato peers through a window, clay still on his hands, and notes the proceedings with some dismay.

“Why?” Sariatu asks, craning her neck to look up at Beetle. Still sitting she can only see his chest, plated in dark armour and bursting with frankly terrifying eagerness.

“I was going to show the boys how it works,” he says casually, then drops to his knees to be on level with her. “Just a few stances, nothing big.”

“I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”

Beetle’s pupils are reflective, but warm. It makes his gaze seem unfocused, and in the light of high noon his eyes are all but medallions of gold. “It’ll be fine,” he promises, then glances at the people around him. “Everyone just wants to see what this is all about.”

There are murmurs of agreement that Sariatu doesn’t care to process at the moment.

“It’s a relic of unimaginable power,” she insists, pulling the sword close to her chest, “It’s not a toy.”

He holds his hands out hopefully, but doesn’t try to grab it from her. “It’s a sword, I’m a samurai. We were made for each other.”

Everyone looks so expectant. They want a show, and despite her best efforts, Sariatu hasn’t been able to deliver anything more than scraps of a story that already fades from memory.

She surrenders the sword. “I don’t want anyone else to have it,” she warns him. “Someone could lose an eye.” Aside from childhood games and maybe a bit of bow practice in the woods, these people have no experience with weapons. A strange peace lies over the town, and it has made the people safe and a little reckless.

Beetle snatches it triumphantly and holds it over his head. “Behold the Sword Unbreakable!” he cries, and there are there appropriate oohs and aahs from the crowd. Business slowly grinds to a halt and the people start to form a rough circle with practiced ease. After some advisory whispers from older and wiser heads, Beetle gestures for them to back up, and reluctantly they do. Maybe no one will get maimed today.

Sariatu shakes her head and turns to Monkey, sprawled out a few feet away and on a break from her young devotees. Only a few older girls have been permitted to sit near her and spin, and they too have been distracted by the display of martial force.

“I want a sword,” one girl whispers in awe, and Sariatu gives up on finding sympathy here.

Beetle waves the Sword Unbreakable around like a play prop, then starts going through forms _very, very badly_. It’s not technically terrible swordsmanship, but it is unnecessarily unorthodox and she knows he’s showboating. There is never any need for that many flourishes or spins, and his footwork can only be described as flashy.

She pushes through the crowd, crosses the dusty space towards him and catches his arm. He blinks in confusion. The sword is still held over his head and it glints in the steadily dying sunlight.

“Is something wrong?”

Sariatu gestures for him to give the sword back, “Yes, your stance is awful. I’m not going to let you teach everyone how to fight in the worst way possible.”

Beetle glances at their audience, “First of all, it’s called style. And it doesn’t matter if it’s not traditional, as long as it gets the job done.”

“It’s sloppy,” Sariatu says, more harshly than she intended. She gentles her voice and reaches up on tiptoes to pull the sword hilt from his hands. “I’m sure it works for you, but it’s better to stick with the basics sometimes.”

The Sword Unbreakable is ancient, but has a surprisingly modern silhouette. The single edged, curved blade lend itself well to long sweeps, smooth motions that seem to cut through the air. She takes a second to find the balance and reorient herself between earth and sky, then starts going through the slow patterns of a practice series. Even after all these years it is as automatic as playing her shamisen. This is, after all, what she was made for.

Once upon a time she floated through the air, her robes billowing around her. When she walked on the wind as easily as she walked on the earth her clothing was no impediment to fighting. Now it weighs her down, tangles around her feet, and makes every step a battle. The exaggerated blocks and blows might come naturally, but she has to struggle to keep her footing, and that keeps her from focusing on the audience watching her with wide eyes.

She finishes the set and finds herself looking at Beetle’s awestruck face.

“That was really good,” he admits, “But I feel like we’re not getting the Unbreakable part as much. Does anyone have something we can use…?”

There is a bustle around her, as Sariatu catches her breath, and when she looks up Beetle is placing a hunk of rough wood on the ground in front of her. Not a challenge for an axe, but certainly one for a single-edged sword designed more for slashing than deep cuts. Even a good samurai’s sword is brittle, there is a reason the Sword Unbreakable is an artifact of power. A blade that never dullens, that never chips or falters, there is an understated power there.

She knows this, and she still hesitates to just start hacking away at a log. It seems so _undignified_.

“I’ll do it if you won’t,” Beetle says cheerfully, and she gives him back the sword.

Cheers rise up as he starts attacking the poor log with all his might. This is a show, one Sariatu could never put on. Every confident grin, every  dramatic pause, is designed to please, and he somehow manages to make wood cutting look almost heroic.

The end result is a pile of woodchips, a mauled husk of a log, and a pristine sword blade. Sariatu is torn between being impressed and utterly horrified, and the villagers seem to share her sentiments.

Hashi checks the sword blade with a silly smile. “You haven’t spent much time cutting wood, have you?” he asks Beetle.

Beetle shakes his head. “Of course not, I was a samurai warrior,” he gives Sariatu a furtive glance and then looks back to Hashi, “Want to hold it?”

His glee is palpable, like a joyous smog in the air. Other faces grow suddenly interested as well; a bright eyed woman with a sickle on her back who reminds Sariatu painfully of Karasu, two young men clinging to each other’s arms like lovers and smiling giddily at one another. Since there is apparently nothing she can do to keep Beetle from tutoring everyone in a fifty mile radius in swordplay, she steps back and wearily suggests he keep it to the basics.

The crowd surges forward, and Beetle lights up like a dead tree next to a campfire. Still, he is careful as he places the sword in Hashi’s big hand, keeping on arm to steady and guide as he pulls his new best friend through the opening forms of a basic kata, talking all the while.

“Two hands, and keep an eye on your surroundings. I nearly cut one of my friend’s heads off when I was young and stupid-”

“Oh, _my_ ,” says a voice behind her that sounds suspiciously like Hosato.

“That was a sharp lesson,” Beetle says, and giggles at his own joke as he pulls Hashi’s arm back. “Remember, the sword is important but it’s nothing compared to focus. Be aware of yourself, of your opponent, of the things around you. Anyone can fight well, but it takes a true warrior to use everything around him to his advantage.”

The adage is oddly familiar, but she cannot remember why.

“How long do you have to practice?” Hashi says, entranced.

Beetle thinks for a while. “A few hours every day, at the least. It takes a long time to master the sword, though anyone can use one. It’s not alchemy. I think- I think we used to train with regular soldiers, and they could give us a run for our money sometimes. Even the most powerful warrior can be defeated by someone very smart with a sharp stick. Or an archer! An archer can beat anyone.” He says it with some pride, and it’s obvious where his loyalties lie.

“And what could someone do with that sword?” an old man asks from the crowd. Beetle’s eyes mist over with half remembered memories again.

“Anything. We used to talk about what we’d do once we found the armor of legends. The adventures we’d go on, the monsters we’d fight. We would…” he trails off. Between the craning heads of villagers, in the last light of day, Sariatu sees his grip slacken. The sword dips before Hashi steadies it again.

Then Beetle gasps, and moves with lightning speed, darting through the people to grab Sariatu’s shoulders with all four of his hands. His eyes are so wide she wonders for a second if they’ll just fall out of his skull.

“I know where it is!” he wheezes.

She can’t ask ‘what?’, the words escape her, but her thoughts must be written all over her face. His joy does not dim in the slightest.

“The armour, I know where the armour is! It’s under a lake, with- with monsters? Something bad. But’s it’s under a lake, I just know it is.” Emotions too big for her to process flit through her mind, each one quickly replaced with another. Shock, then confusion, then doubt. How could he know something like this? He was just a warrior, surely he wouldn’t know what even she can’t remember.

He isn’t done talking. “I know it sounds weird, but you have to trust me. I had one of my flashes, it came to me like a picture. I’m positive it’s under Long Lake.”  


It makes sense, a lake is safe from the eyes of the gods of heaven, and the Long Lake is infamous for its monsters. Only...

“We were just there!” she whispers. So close, and they had trekked all the way back here to look for guidance that was in Beetle’s head the whole time.

“I know, I know, but now we know where to go. We know where to look. We’ll find it,” he promises, and for a moment his gaze is steady, reliable. For a moment he looks like someone she recognizes from long ago.

A ragged cheer goes up from the crowd, and the moment is lost. It is quickly followed by the tolling of a bell somewhere close by, and Sariatu looks around until she finds the village bell high across the street. Sure enough, the sun is sinking past the horizon, over the sea. Maybe she’ll be able to think better in the night.

“I need to go,” she says, and gestures back to the porch where her shamisen lies abandoned.

Beetle nods. “Right, right,” he ushers her back to cover, and they are followed by curious eyes. The villagers have questions, she can tell, but there is time for that.

Monkey gives Sariatu a lazy look  before going back to combing through her fur with her fingers. “We know where the Breastplate is.” Sariatu stage whispers, more for the benefit of the onlookers than her simian companion.

Beetle has returned to the sword and his students, before anyone can stab themselves to death on accident, but he keeps glancing back over to her, worried and proud of himself.

Kameyo ambles over, and slowly Sariatu realizes that children and older people, those too clever or too fragile to be playing with swords at twilight, have gathered around her.

Her hand moves to her shamisen automatically. As the light fades she can begin to think more clearly.

She arranges her robes around herself and tries to smile. They want to know what just happened, but at too polite to ask. She definitely doesn’t have the presence of mind for a long explanation at the moment, but she has something almost as good. The music comes without cumbersome words, or a storyline that must be finished. There is no need for thought, just emotion, and she has plenty of the latter at the moment.

“That was all exciting, I know, but I think I promised you a song?”

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


There was so _much_ of the Moon Kingdom. If Kubo had thought finding his eyes would be hard before, it certainly seemed impossible now.

Yukami walked him through empty halls full of riches, hallways silent as the grave, rooms for incense and rooms for star gazing and rooms for meditation. Bridges crossed still rivers, frozen in time. Statues of gods sat next to rooms full of divinity, and ornamental offering tables sat empty, for who was there for the gods themselves to pray to?

Further on there were more mundane spaces, weaving rooms and closets of starlight spun silks, but even they were ornate. Yukami guided his hands over delicate carvings and polished metal and faceted jewels the size of his fists. She wasn’t a very good guide, preferring action to talk, but that gave Kubo plenty of room to explore his surroundings on his own.

Nothing screamed ‘ _human secrets and child-eyes hidden here!_ ’ but it was progress of a sort.

“What’s this?” he asked for the hundredth time, spinning in a slow circle to try to get his bearings in the latest room. The air was closed in, and he thought they were several shells of blinds and paper screens away from fresh air. If he stretched out his arms he could feel fine curtains in front of him, if he kicked out his feet there was a raised dais.

“Some room,” Yukami said, because she was no help whatsoever. “There are many of them empty, the further we get from Grandfather.”

“Why?”

“Why not?” she countered. “There is power in empty spaces, in having a place for every star in the heavens to sit in splendour even if they choose not to attend on him at all times.”

That struck Kubo as wasteful, but he wasn’t a politician or a god. Maybe having lots of empty rooms made sense. It wasn’t as if they were going to get dusty.

They kept moving, until they could go no further. Yukami described the gardens in all their flawless, tasteful beauty to him, but he got bored quickly. Here the mirror lakes of the central residence gave way to grey craters and moon mountains and carefully placed rocks, which were of little interest to Kubo.

He leaned over the railing, let his sleeves drag in the dirt, and yawned theatrically. “Maybe we should go back.”

Yukami tugged on the back of his collar, steadying him in case he decided to have another under-floor adventure. “Already? We have not even explored the northern pavilions yet. I thought you wanted to see things, little nephew.” She had been taking no small amount of joy in making even marvels sound dull and drab.

“Yes, but this is just,” Kubo gestured at his surroundings, his hand knocking into a wooden post as he did so, “just nothing. Nothing important. I bet no one else has been here in centuries. It’s dead space.”

“Nothing here dies,” she said, with a smile in her voice, curling like leaves in a fire. “It is simply unchanging. Perfect.”

“Hollow,” Kubo corrected, and kicked at the floor. His socks slid across the unnaturally smooth wood. It would probably be very fun to slide down these halls, but he doubted he could get away with it. “I don’t like it. I want to go back somewhere where people are.”

“Very well,” she acquiesced. Simple as that. Kubo followed the path she cut through the ancient air, and caught up with her halfway down the hall. She was walking fast, fast enough that he had to jog to keep up, but she was still was being too nice, all things considered, and he didn’t trust it.

They took a different way back to the populated portion of the sprawling palace, one Kubo didn’t recognize. What he did recognize what the insistent thumping sound, first merely a faint beat but growing steadily louder as they walked forward. The busy noises were a stark contrast to the absolute silence they had just left, and the sound seemed to resonate up from the ground as well, thudding through the floorboards and jolting up his feet.

He lurched forward and caught the edge of Yukami’s armor. “What’s that?” he demanded, as she stopped and turned towards him. “I want to know what that is.”

He hadn’t been back to the Courtyard of Mysterious Noises since the Lord of the North Star had caught him there and gotten all fussy. It hadn’t seemed important in the general scheme of things, but now he was curious again.

Yukami went suddenly taut, like a string pulled tight and about to snap. “What do you know of it?” she asked, back to questions again. Kubo realized he’d upset her again, somehow. Still, that was no reason to give up.

“Nothing, just that it’s loud and people don’t want me asking about it,” he said. “Is it important?”

Not a sound. He let go of Yukami and started to move towards the sound. If he remembered correctly there was a step down, and then a walkway surrounding it completely, with no place to go in or out. His aunt caught him as he started to climb down to the ground.

“Don’t interrupt them,” she hissed.

Kubo threw his arms up, “Who?! What’s happening down there?” When he got nothing but a stony silence he leaned back, until the back of his head bumped against her side. “Someone is going to have to tell me at some point,” he reminded her.

“Forgive me if I do not spill our greatest secrets to a flighty human child,” she said acerbically. “One who has spent most of the past few months making trouble at every turn.”

That demanded some sort of self defense. “Only because no one will tell me anything. Auntie, please. I just want to understand.”

She sighed heavily, and let go of him, like she didn’t want to make any more contact than absolutely necessary. “If I tell you this, nephew, could you be convinced to mind your manners for a while? Your aunties are growing tired of your antics.” Underneath her usual mocking tone is something that might be real frustration.

“I’ll be good,” Kubo lied, “I promise.” Falsehood was necessary, sometimes, especially when you were outmatched at all turns. It was like telling a story, sometimes you needed to stretch the truth for everyone’s benefit. Well, mostly for his benefit. He felt guilt well up in his stomach, guilt at upsetting everyone and guilt at upsetting his family in particular. He wanted to be respectful, be a good child, but sometimes you just had to break the rules. His memories were more important than good behavior, and his mother’s memory probably outranked his aunts’ will.

Yukami sat on the step, and Kubo sat a few feet away, close enough to hear but not too close for mutual comfort. The fire demon in her pipe unfurled as she took a long breath, and Kubo could hear its rushing to fill the space around them. Karasu had told him once that his clothes were in shades of blue and silver, like Grandfather. They must have made a good contrast, his grim aunt and him.

“Over there is immortality,” Yukami said after some consideration. “It does not come easily, even to the gods, and there is always a cost to magic. Remember that well, Kubo.”

He had no idea what she was talking about. He leaned in to listen closer.

“You must understand, the moon has not always been Grandfather’s home, but it has always been _theirs_. They are older than I am, older than your mother, old as Grandfather. When the cosmos were first formed, when weakness and decay first entered the world, the gods sought to find some way to keep the disease from reaching them.” She spoke of death with such vehemence that Kubo drew back slightly.

“They found a particular mixture helped them stave off the negative impacts of contact with mortality. Your mother proves that even goddesses can become weak after too long in the mortal realm. It serves as a sort of… medicine, inoculating against the virus of humanity, purifying and refining divinity, and granting us more power. This elixir was closely guarded by the eldest of the immortals, who allowed only a few trusted creatures to know the recipe to create it. One was a rabbit, who though once mortal showed such purity of heart that it was taken to the heavens, placed on the moon, and set to the task of creating the elixir for the gods. And rabbits multiply.” There was a distinct sneer to her voice now.

“They are important, very much so, but they were of the earth originally and most prefer not to think of the work they do. Weakness is not something to be contemplated, but when Grandfather made his court here he let them be. He built the palace around them, to guard them and protect them, and ordered that they be left to their work. They make the elixir, and we drink it and live, and no one speaks about it because it is simply not spoken of. I would recommend you do the same.”

Kubo had so many questions, but first and most importantly:

“So, there’s rabbits down there. Are they furry? What colour are they? Are they regular rabbits, or are they different because they’re moon rabbits?” He could barely remember what a rabbit looked like, but the general impression left in his mind was one of soft fur and meat that was good to eat. It didn’t scream, ‘immortality’ to him.

“They are what they are,” Karasu said, probably just to be infuriating. She puffed on her pipe and smoke curled tighter around Kubo, telling him to be quiet.

“This elixir is the one grandfather wants me to drink?” Kubo said, mind racing. “To, uh, take all the human out of me?” It was still a strange and scary thought. Half a person wasn’t much of a person at all, and he couldn’t think of himself without the humanity everyone around him so desperately tried to deny. It had been there from the moment he’d woken up on the Moon and needed to use the bathroom, to his family’s dismay and disgust. It was as undeniable as the ground below his feet.

He had magic and he had the moon in his blood, that was undeniable as well, but his heart was tethered to the earth. He felt like a bird who had flown too far and touched the stars, floating halfway in between the place he couldn’t remember but loved instinctively, and the place he knew and knew he was wanted in.

“To make you stronger,” Yukami corrected, one hand tipping his chin so he would have been looking at her if he had eyes to look with. “To make you belong here. To heal you of the sickness your mother so cruelly gave you.” She still tripped over the word mother, still tensed at the mere thought of her lost sister, but her gaze was on Kubo. He could feel it.

And put that way, it was almost tempting. No more doubt, no more feeling out of place. Kubo bit his lip.

“What is it like?” he asked.

“Like being made anew, better and stronger,” she said, then laughed lightly. “I could show you it, if you want.”

Kubo weighed the chances of it being a trick, and decided to be daring. “Okaaay,” he said, and Yukami grabbed his left arm, turning it palm up and rolling his sleeve back with one smooth motion.

“I carry a little, she told him conversationally, pressing one clammy finger to the inside of his wrist, as if to check his pulse. “We deal with humans more than most, carrying out our father’s bidding.”

She let his arm rest on her knees, drew something from within her robes, and for a few moments all he could hear was a flurry of movement. His instincts were screaming for him to move, but he kept his arm still, held his breath in anticipation.

Then cold fire seared into his skin. Underneath the pain he could feel wetness, as if something heavy and liquid were just dropped onto his bare wrist, but that is overpowered by the sensation of ice rushing up his veins, trying to stop his heart.

He let out a cry like a wounded animal, pulled back automatically, and frantically rubbed his injured arm on the front of his robes. Whatever it was, it clung to his skin tenaciously, sending more jolts of biting pain up his arm. Yukami seemed almost as panicked as he was, yanking at his shoulder shakily in a half hearted attempt to get him to give her back the immortalized limb, but Kubo wasn’t going to trust her now, not in a moment of desperation.

His feathered cloak seemed to get most of the elixir off, and after a moment the pain subsided, leaving only a feeling of numbness and a patch of skin as cold as the waters of the Moon Kingdom.

Kubo shuddered. Yukami seemed to regain her senses, and the fire demon quickly joined her efforts to get his arm back. He surrendered it, grudgingly.

“That is not what I intended,” she said softly, as she looked over her handiwork. “I… did not expect it to have such an effect on you.” It was almost an apology.

“Guess I am really human,” Kubo replied shakily.

“No, you are young.” She pulled his sleeve back down over his hand and folded it back up to his chest. “And eternity is a powerful thing. You do not yet have the presence of mind to comprehend it.”

“Yeah, it hurt. A lot.” The accusation in his voice was quiet, but still there.

The pounding noise had stopped at some point while Kubo was preoccupied with pain, and now something approached. He heard Yukami more float up than stand, and move forward without bothering to touch the ground. She spoke softly but sharply with something, and after a pause, the rhythmic pounding resumed.

“Does it always hurt that much?” Kubo asked when she returned.

There was a whisper of feathers, denoting some gesture he couldn’t quite figure out. “Magic is not a harmless practice, Kubo. These things have a funny way of balancing out.”

Their voices were very different, but for a second he could imagine his mother saying that. He shivered. The cold was slowly subsiding from his body, but he was still worried. “Is it safe to touch it?” he ventured.

“One must drink of the medicine of the gods for to work, yes,” Yukami said, amused rather than reassuring. “You’ll be fine.” Kubo’s restless mind settled somewhat.

“Anymore secrets I should know about?” he asked. “Terrible weapons or treasure rooms or anything?” _My eyes,_ he thought.

Yukami drew herself to her feet. She didn’t push off the ground like Kubo did when she stood, she simply unfolded, like there was a string at the top of her head pulling her up. “There are many objects of great power here, but nothing dangerous to you, nephew. Most artifacts are bound to the realm of mortals,” she was talking over him now, like someone recounting an old frustration or ancient battle. “Or in some other court of the heavens or earth. Your grandfather keeps the rest of them safe. You do not need to worry about stumbling on them.”

That was something. He wasn’t sure quite what it meant for him yet, but it was _something_. There were things he was not meant to find, and they were someplace Yukami was confident he would not find them, someplace close to Grandfather? He needed to think. He also needed a nap. It felt like the elixir had drained the life out of him, and his left side was weaker than his right.

Kubo stood as well, more shakily, and Yukami steadied him with a hand at the back of his neck.

“Back to your room?”

He nodded. She took his arm and led him back, and the added guidance meant he had time to think. Bits and pieces of information were laid out before him, but he still didn’t have enough to make a full story, not enough to make a plan.

Not yet, anyways.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


“Crazy night, huh?” Beetle says to her after the last of the people creep back home. Lanterns and fires still illuminate the village and distant chatter can be heard from houses, but the street is finally empty.

She and Beetle are sitting on Hosato’s porch. Not-Hanzo is trapped in Beetle’s lap, unable to climb over his legs and not supposed to. After nearly breaking some pottery, it was decided he was better someplace contained. Monkey is next to Sariatu, munching on assorted fruit offerings collected from various people. Little Mari is asleep half on top of her, snoring gently. She’d wanted to stay up and had dozed off combing Monkey’s fur. Her father had said it was better to leave her before he’d gone to bed.

Sariatu picks her comb from the floor, where is had fallen from Mari’s limp fingers as she drifted into sleep. She places it back in her pack carefully, mindful of the fragile wood.

“It was nice,” she replies. “Energetic, but nice.”

The moon is peeking out over rooftops now, making her instinctively shy back, but she is safe here, under a solid roof, with Beetle by her side.

“I think we should set out again in the morning,” she tells Beetle, to keep her mind off of things she cannot control. “As early as possible. We have a lot of ground to cover to get back to the Long Lake.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he nods in affable but confused agreement. “That sounds… good. Um, remind me again why we can’t go out at night? I know it has something to do with your evil father in the sky, but I’m not sure I understand the _logistics_ . Why nighttime? Why do you not get along with your family? Sorry if that’s a sore subject, I just really have _no_ idea what’s going on.”

She’s explained it, yes, but she hasn’t really explained it properly and vague sentiments are too much for Beetle to handle. He forgets, he gets confused, and far be it from her to criticize anyone for that.

If there was ever a time for a story, it’s now. She isn’t tired yet and the night stretches out ahead of them.

“Honestly, I cannot stress this enough, I am clueless,” Beetle continues, and she thinks he’s just talking to fill the empty air now. “Handsome, yes. Wonderful fighter, absolutely. Just not really up to date on what we’re doing and who we’re fighting and why you have a magical Monkey.”

“Beetle.”

He talks on, undissuaded. “I mean, I’m not in a position to be throwing stones here, but I feel like if we were all just going to be named after animals we should have _committed_ , y’know? Just two looks a bit unbalanced.”

“ _Beetle._ ”

An owl hoots in the forest, and across the town someone laughs. This time of night all the sounds seem muffled, and Sariatu finds her voice growing even softer than usual. It is not a time for loud noises. In the day the town is full of life, but in the night everything is whispers.

“Sorry, got carried away.”

Beetle, of course, is his usual loud self. Sometimes he’s too oblivious for words. He has the manner of a noble raised for combat, perhaps the loudest proof that he was once the samurai he claims, but underneath it he’s so unrefined it would make her family choke.

She glances at the moon again and touches Monkey’s flank, just to remind herself where she is and what she is fighting for. Then she exhales slowly and tries to remember where she came from.

It is a long story to tell. She is (was) immortal, after all.

“No, it’s fine. You deserve to know what is happening, and why. I can’t remember everything, but I can tell you what I do remember. It starts with my father, a very long time ago. Long before I was created, but you asked why it is the night we need to avoid and that’s a tale older than humanity.” Beetle and Monkey are looking at her expectantly. Somehow they are more of a crowd than the villagers could ever be. She takes another long, shuddering breath.

“Once there were two siblings who ruled all the heavens together. How they got there and where they came from is unimportant, but they lived together contentedly. She was the more powerful of the two and ruled the sun, while her younger brother was the god of storms.”

This part she knows by heart, and the words slide off her tongue easily. She cannot remember how humans tell this story, but she knows the version she grew up with, as biased as it is. When she’d loved Hanzo she’d spent hours separating her father’s lies and grudges from the truth of her past. Now all she can focus on are the bare bones of the narrative.

“Back then, the moon and sun sat together in the sky, and there was no separation between night and day. The world was young, and everything was still taking shape, even the gods. But slowly out of the chaos of the early world came order. Lesser deities filled the sky with the siblings. Spirits of the earth and air and seas grew up out of the earth. Monsters were born, and humans and animals came to populate the world as well.”

Beetle points to himself, excitedly. Not-Hanzo peers over his carapaced legs with interest.

“They were both immortal, and very powerful, and like most siblings they didn’t always get along. But as time went by and they grew up their squabbles grew in intensity and seriousness. Once it was only the two of them among the clouds, and they had to make up. Now, surrounded by other beings, rulers of the sky, they could hurt each other more and they did.”

She has never met her aunt, and all she has to go on are second-hand stories and the fact that even after all these years daylight suffocates her, like a fish on dry land. At the very least the Lady of the Sun is just as good at holding grudges as father is. Besides that little fact Sariatu has no quarrel with her.

“My father did something terrible, or several somethings terrible. Things escalated. There was a fight, the likes of which had never been seen in the heavens before, and he left his sister’s court to form his own. He chose the moon as his new home and made himself a god there, abandoning storms for a more lofty domain. In response, my aunt banished him and all who followed him from her sight. The sun and moon sat at opposite ends of the sky, never meeting for long, always at odds with one another. In the day the sun drowned out the stars, and in the night the moon reflected the light stolen from it. They remade the heavens to suit themselves, remade the world around them, and they never spoke again.”

“Wow,” Beetle whispers. “That’s kind of overkill.”

He’s not wrong, but the comment throws her off. She has to concentrate to find her place again.

“I suppose it was. Gods don’t do anything by half measures.” She does, and it is almost a point of pride now. “Even separated by the sunrise and sunset, they still found ways to argue in the early days. I don’t know how, exactly, father was never clear about that, but they still fought for dominance over the heavens, and tried to best each other in magical feats. It was a difficult time for everyone. Finally they settled into a sort of peace, and my father decided he would have a child to do his will on earth, and I suspect to spite his sister. He took off the hilt of his sword, wrapped it in starlight, and breathed on it, and I was born.”  
  
Once she could recall the very moment, shining and wonderful. Now the memory is faded and tarnished by pain. Her father’s triumphant face is no longer a sight worth remembering.

Still, Sariatu appreciates her existence. The love she has known far outweighs the suffering. Even a moment in Hanzo’s embrace or sitting with Kubo had been worth an eternity of night.

“He was proud. I was his own, nothing more and nothing less. But one child was not enough. A king needed more. Not too many, nine would be too much, but definitely more than two. So he broke the blade of his sword in half and made my sisters. We were our father’s children from the moment of our birth, and so we were banished from the day. Even now… it’s not ideal for me. A few months ago I could barely speak between sunrise and sunset.”

“That makes sense,” Beetle says, “But how’d you end up on earth? Your family doesn’t seem happy about that.”

Sariatu hesitates, but there’s really no reason not to tell him. She has been rehearsing the story in her head for years, until Kubo was finally old enough to hear it in full, but it still feels unsteady balanced on her tongue.

“I-I fell in love. It was like stepping into the light after living in the dark for so long and I never looked back.” She had, repeatedly, but this way sounds better. ‘ _I looked back, kept thinking about stopping, but couldn’t stop loving him no matter how I tried_ ’ just doesn’t have the same dramatic effect.

Beetle has the patient, keen expression of someone listening intently. He doesn’t have visible ears, but that doesn’t stop them from being sharp. Sariatu frets as she tries to remember how the story goes next. Starting with the centuries of murders probably isn’t the best idea, but there’s really no other way to phrase it.

“I was sent to kill him,” she says, after some debate. “Our father didn’t like it when humans grew too powerful, and any human looking for the armour of legends was a threat in his eyes. My sisters and I had killed countless heroes before, brave men and women with good hearts and powerful magic and armies at their disposal. I didn’t think he’d be any different.”

“But he was,” Beetle adds promptly.

“Yes, he was. I came down alone, leaving my sisters behind to fight him as he prayed at a temple. I didn’t expect much of a fight. I told him he had offended my father and brought the wrath of the heavens down upon him, and I moved to strike him down. He dodged, somehow, and had his sword in his hand immediately. Blow after blow I rained down upon him, but none struck and he fought back. We duelled on and on, neither of us able to win. Then as our swords locked he looked into my eyes and said… he said….”

Her brow furrows. Crickets chirp in the night.

Beetle’s patience shatters, “What did he say?”

“I can’t remember….” Sariatu presses her palms to her face and tries to nurse away her rising headache. Her scar is a rough line under her hands, and it feels far deeper a gash than she know is truly there.

“Was it ‘I love you?’” Beetle presses, leaning forward and looking up at her. Monkey stirs, and there is a soft noise from Mari who Sariatu had forgotten was even there. Suddenly even the soft noises of the evening seem overwhelming as she drowns in the sea of uncertainty.

“No, I don’t think it was. He said... I’m sorry, I can’t remember.” She looks at Beetle, who has leaned so far in that she has to look down to properly see him. His red face blends in with the headache haze boiling up from the back of her skull.

Beetle straightens and gives her a sympathetic smile. “I think I got the gist. Secret marriage, had a kid, army comes down from the heavens and slaughters everyone. It was a beautiful story.”  


He’s horribly sincere. Sariatu smiles back, and Monkey passes her what she thinks is a persimmon of condolence. Or maybe it’s just a persimmon. She rolls the fruit between her hands and glances up at the moon.

“The most beautiful story I’ve ever told,” she reaffirms. “My legacy for my child. Beetle… you will take care of Kubo, won’t you?”

Monkey gives an indignant squawk and Beetle’s face twists with concern.  “I mean, obviously I will, he’s the heir to my clan. The son of my master! But he’s your son too. I’m just here to help.”

“Something might happen to me,” she tells him, in the steadiest voice she can manage. “This quest is dangerous. My family is dangerous. Someone needs to be there for him, no matter what, and I trust you. I can’t finish this story. I haven’t been able to remember the endings for _years_.” Looking back at her history now, she can’t see it ending any other way, and she needs some comfort.

Beetle reaches over and places a hand on her shoulder. “I will, I swear it. No matter what. But I don’t think you’re getting off that easily. No matter what happens, your story will never end. These people,” his arms encompass the village at large, “Will remember it and tell it, even if you forget it yourself. You came and told me who I was supposed to be. Just because you don’t know the ending, doesn’t mean it stops existing. And just because it doesn’t end, doesn’t mean it’s not beautiful. Your story was beautiful, and it’s not done yet.”

It’s a lot of meaningless drivel, but it’s so well meant. She remembers someone whispering to her long ago on an autumn night, words that didn’t mean anything but meant everything. Words that changed her life.

Sariatu tosses him the persimmon. She doesn’t have the stomach for it, and it’s getting late.

“Thank you,” she says, and turns to go to sleep.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> -The fact that the people in the village grow a lot of wheat, but Kubo and his mother eat rice, suggest that there is a multi-grain system going on there. Lots of work for the villagers there. Plus, grindstones are a complicated technology in and of themselves! Harvest are nearly as important as quests, and next to all the godly shenanigans are real people who do need to eat. I just worry about the villagers sometimes. 
> 
> \- I've sort of been waffling from the beginning on how I wanted to portray same-sex relationships in this fic. They are very period accurate for most of Japanese history, but also a complicated subject I was hesitant to deal with. But this is a fantasy world, so I can do what I want, and the Sun Village is a very chill place. 
> 
> \- Swords in general are kind of fragile. They're very prone to chippage, and with a single edged, highly honed sword of the style used in this universe you would have to be very careful to keep from damaging a sword. There's a reason there's a cutting edge and a flat side, so you don't nick up your nice sharp blade with blocking. The Sword Unbreakable is a game changer precisely because of that. Not having to worry about ruining your sword opens up a whole new world of fighting, and would probably be of huge help to an inexperienced swordsman. 
> 
> -The Moon Kingdom is still based on the shinden-zukuri style of the Heian era, but it's like a thousand palaces all strung together. One story and sprawling. It's also got a lot of empty rooms because of symbolism. 
> 
> \- Moon Rabbit and the elixir of immortality! I've been sitting on this one since chapter one. I needed a mechanism to explain why Sariatu was so much weaker after an extended period living on the earth, and why she was ready for questing again after her fight with her sister. (Just to clear up the timeline, Yukami did slip her a bit of the elixir, for reasons of her own that are complicated and mostly angry. That's why Sariatu is a little more together after chapter one, she's got a little bit of a booster.) The moon rabbit is a motif in lots of stories, including in Japan, and I knew I had to bring it in somehow. I chose to go with the Chinese interpretation, where the rabbit is pounding the herbs to make the elixir of the immortals which sustains the gods. The Japanese version involves the rabbit pounding rice for moon cakes, and a detail that didn't make it into the final chapter cut is that the rabbits on the moon are also responsible for the food Kubo has been eating to stay alive, since they're mostly mortal like him too. I figured that would just confuse people and invite theories though. 
> 
> \- It's not great for Kubo because he is still a child and he is very, very human. Historically attempts to replicate the elixir of immortality ended in lots of mercury poisoning, and I wanted a little bit of that in his reaction. Never trust strange substances that give you eternal life. Sometimes it's just going to give you heavy metal poisoning. In universe the explanation probably has a lot more to do with his body still growing and not appreciating anything trying to stand in the way of that. 
> 
> -Now for the real worldbuilding. I spliced together about six pieces of Shinto and Buddhist religion to create the story Sariatu tells here. The main components are the story of Ameratsu, godess of the sun, and her brothers. She has two, Susanoo and Tsukiyomi, and she didn't get along with either of them. Susanoo is the god of storms, and since the Moon King has been called Raiden (another god of storms) in ancillary material I decided maybe he was a storm god who made himself the god of the moon later. His spat with his sister is based on Ameratsu argument with her brother Tsukiyomi over his murder of the goddess of food (who he basically killed for being gross and human-ish), which led to night and day being separate. 
> 
> \- Sariatu's creation is based on the story of Ameratsu and Susanoo having a contest to see who was better. Ameratsu took his sword, chewed it, spat it out and created three goddesses, while he made five gods from her necklace. Ameratsu claimed that since he gods had come from one of her possessions, she was the winner, and Susanoo just kind of gathered up his three new daughters and left all huffy. The daughters are never mentioned again in any stories I could find, and it reminded me very much of Sariatu and her sisters. In my version of the story the Moon King makes them out of his own sword, on his own, but still to kind of one up his sister. Because Sariatu is canonically older, she was created first, then Yukami and Karasu later.
> 
> -Hopefully this is a new twist on this storyline, and managed to change enough to maintain the fantasy barrier between worlds. There's a fine line between inspiration and appropriation, and when the source material is such a beautiful and complex cultural and religious canon, you really don't want to mess up.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone, thank you for sticking with me over so far. April I did another writing project, which was super fun, but I am very happy to be back to Kubo. We're getting closer to end game. As always, some annotations are at the bottom and I can be found on tumblr at herenortherenearnorfar.tumblr.com. I'm terrible about conversations, but I do really appreciate everyone who has dropped in to talk with me as well as all the lovely feedback on this project (now officially my longest to date) so far.

Sariatu surveys the sunset on the Long Lake. It comes more quickly, as winter approaches, throwing off their quest and necessitating long nights of hiding.

Other than that, she and Beetle had made good time. They are back where they started, on the sandy beach, the rough cliffs and rocks where the Sword Unbreakable had been hiding in the background.

The water gleams in the setting sunlight, gold and red and shimmering yellows dancing off the lake as it stretches into the horizon. There is no telling where under the lake the Breastplate Impenetrable is, but there are always markers of magic if you know where to look. Locals will know where not to fish, shoals of marine life will stay away from where the monsters lurk. Paper does not fare well under water, but if she can find some late autumn leaves she can make a flotilla of scouts to search the depths for her.

Beetle clears his throat behind her. “I guess we should find cover?” he suggests. Monkey is wandering further and further down the strand, away from the water and towards safety.

Already, the shining sun is abandoning them to the dangers of moonlight. Sariatu nods, and they follow Monkey towards a cave they know is hidden among the rocks on the shore. Caves are handy things, provided nothing is living in them already.

She stops them at the entrance, where a layer of crunchy brown leaves lay, already disintegrating. They will be gone soon, but for now, she can use them. The song she plays is quick paced, and makes her fingers ache, however it puts the right fighting spirit into the little leaf kingfishers she makes. Spots of orange and burgundy peek out from the swirling mass of dead brown and tan, little hints of life that have stubbornly survived. Shame she’s about to drown them.

Kingfishers are made for diving, even tiny ones, and she sends them out over the water to explore before she collapses against the rock face. The more magic she remembers, the greater the toll it takes on her body. The pick-me-up Yukami had so cruelly administered was not meant to sustain such magical exertion. It’s hard to tell how long even her diminished capacity for magic will last her, especially with a brain that lacks the edges needed for divine precision.

Beetle scoops her up and carries her into the cave just as the last rays of sunlight disappear. He sets her down gently pushes her hair out of her face, and Sariatu feels safe enough to rest her eyes while a fire is set up and food found. She eats lightly, trying to remember that this almost-mortal form requires more than the breath of the universe to sustain it.

“Tomorrow morning, we should know where the Breastplate is,” she says once she has forced as much fish as possible down her throat. Monkey takes the rest of it only after several efforts to get her to eat more.

(She means well. Hopefully, she will take care of Kubo as much as she has helped Sariatu these past weeks.)

An anxious tension eases off of Beetle’s face. “Good! I wasn’t sure what those were for, but I figured you knew what you were doing.”

“I wouldn’t go that far in this company,” Sariatu snarks instinctively. It’s the moon, peering in through the cave entrance. It makes her more herself, or perhaps more someone else- that ghost of a goddess from long ago.

There is a bell-like quality to Beetle’s laugh, though it is deep and hearty. Temple bells, taller than a man and twice as wide around, that’s what it reminds Sariatu of. She smiles back, helplessly.

Telling her story has changed something between the two of them. He is less deferential, although admittedly he’d never been very good at that in the first place. She certainly feels she can trust him more now. The chances of her family pulling off a long con like this are slim. They aren’t good at subtlety. Beetle is exactly what he appears to be; a good (insect)man.

Since there is nothing to do but wait until sunrise, Beetle and Monkey drift off to sleep. Sariatu sits up, watching the steady rise and fall of their chests and watching the distant waves crashing on the beach outside their door. The sound of water is soothing. It reminds her of the place that was her home for eleven years.

The stars glitter enticingly in the dark sky, reflecting off the water so it looks like there is sky above and below.

Slowly and surely, she drifts into an uneasy sleep.

 

 

She wakes up from a nightmare to see all her origami paper fluttering to the floor. Dreams are dangerous things, especially for the divine. Her powers have been getting away from her more and more in recent days.

Carefully, she steps around Beetle and the fitfully dozing Monkey and collects the scattered sheets from the cave floor. Once she is almost certain she has all of them, she tucks them back in her pack and breathes out, slowly.

Beetle is twitching in his sleep and mumbling something. He has managed to capture one of Monkey’s paws and is holding it tightly between his hands. It is sweet, in a way. The fitful nature of it reminds her of something she can’t quite place.

Then, she notices the little kingfisher perched on a boulder, just out of the light cast by the dying embers of their fire. It looks crumpled and waterlogged, but it has come back. For a creature made out of leaves well on their way to becoming compost, that’s saying something.

It jumps over to Sariatu and takes up residence on her arm then begins a complicated dance that she can’t fully follow. The meaning however, is clear. There is something below the water.

Well, she’d known that already. Eyes lived there, and ate those who looked into them and were charmed by promises of knowledge. Sariatu can think of a dozen things she could be charmed by.

“Did you see the breastplate?” she whispers to the little leaf bird. Even the slightest noise is harsh in the echoing quiet of the cave. From Beetle’s curled form, Not-Hanzo looks up and stares at her. She gestures him to silence. He has been growing weaker lately, as the magic that maintains him fades. Sariatu is only one demi-goddess. There are only so many plates she can keep spinning at once.

The little red figure grumbles and continues watching, suspiciously. He likes Beetle more than her, somehow. She tries not to hold it against him. All creations deserve a chance to rebel against their maker.

Her tiny kingfisher is chirruping now, or at least trying to. The general effect is one of rustling and the rub of leaves against leaves. It dives off of Sariatu’s arm and flies out of the cave before she can grab it, then hovers, expectantly. The moon shines off of it, drawing a picture of a small bright thing in the grey darkness of night.

She is still drowsy. That is the only explanation for it. She checks that her pack and shamisen are safely tucked against Monkey’s softly breathing form and steps into the night. It is a few yards between her and the water, and she crosses them quickly. At the very edge, where tiny waves lap the rough beach, Sariatu shrugs off her heavy outer robes, until all she is left with is red and white and forged silver. Like a sleepwalker, she wades into the water. Her trousers cling to her legs, then billow around them. The hems swirl in the currents. It is rather like flying again.

Water seeps up her hair which then plasters itself against her face. The coolness makes her scar ache, and that alone gives her pause. The last time she was in water, she almost drowned. The feelings of blood and pain and choking on liquid in her lungs are not ones easily forgotten. Saruatu’s experiences with pain are a few blindingly bright points in a lifetime of darkness. The two most important ones are Kubo’s birth, and the long nightmare when her life ended, when she lost her husband and so nearly lost her son.

Still, she forges onward, already shivering in the cool water. The moon gleams overhead, but it does not seem to be looking at her. That is a small blessing.

Once she could call up storms and clouds and lightening. Now she is diminished and she settles for a gentle tide to carry her when the kingfisher points. Her clothing does not weigh her down as much as it should. Neither does the sword at her waist. She should be drowning, but she does not. She learned how to float millennia ago. Magic helps, though she should not be expending it so recklessly.

The shore recedes from her sight, until it is only mist on the horizon. 

 

 

 

Kubo walked carefully, wary of spies or traps.His efforts, though admirable, were ultimately pointless. No one tried to stop him as he crept down to the Lady’s pavilion.

She gasped in shock as he knelt next to the mountain of silk that contained her being. The surprise was short lived, as all emotions tended to be in this kingdom.

“Little prince,” she reproached, “You are without your carers.”

Kubo smiled so wide his face hurt. He liked a chance to show off. “I snuck out!” he told her, delighted with himself. “I was locked in my room, but I played the wall out of its frame and left through the back.”

It had been a triumph of ingenuity and magic. Realizing that the walls were made out of paper had taken him a while, putting the pieces together and remembering that he could control paper was an even greater feat. Even the fine bamboo curtains and sliding partitions were thin enough that he could manipulate them. Making the paper sections fold up in on themselves without tearing or alerting his keepers had taken some experimentation, but now an entirely new world was open to him. No door could keep him in or out when the walls surrounding it were so fragile.

This changed things. Hopefully it changed them enough.

The Lady sounded suitably impressed and also very concerned. He could hear it in her breathing. “That is… something. Aren’t you worried about being caught?”

He very much was, but he refused to admit it. Fear was like an evil spirit, you could call it if you said its name. “No, not really. No one is going to come looking for me, I said I was sleeping. And it’s so quiet here, I can walk around without getting caught.”

Knowing the schedules of rituals and entertainments helped. When everyone was off dancing or watching the stars, it was easy to sneak around unheeded. The more he learned about the rhythms of the moon, the easier it was to do what he wanted.

“I wanted to talk you you,” Kubo continued, a little nervously, “And Auntie Karasu wouldn’t let me. I don’t think she likes you.”

The Lady had relaxed a little from her earlier discomfort with even small rebellions.Now she tensed again. “Yes, I can see why that might be the case. What did you want to discuss, Kubo?”

She wasn’t playing, not even a note. Kubo thought, maybe she was scared. He tried to keep his voice so as to not spook her.

“I know my eyes are near my grandfather. I’ve been talking to my aunts, I’ve been exploring. There are so many empty rooms. I don’t think he put them there, not if they’re really dangerous. He must keep them somewhere else, someplace I haven’t been allowed to go, yet some where close to him. He has private rooms. I’ve been in them, but never long enough to look around. It’s hard to check a whole room by touch. I wanted to know if you knew anything, anything that could help. Is there a secret place where they keep treasures here?”

“If it was secret, I wouldn’t know,” the Lady said faintly. “As I told you before, I am afraid I cannot help you much, little prince.”

There was a breathiness tightness to her words. After some puzzling Kubo realized she was craning her head, looking up.

“What can you see?” he blurted.

The faint breeze present everywhere in the Moon Kingdom picked up, ruffling Kubo’s hair.

“The earth is especially clear tonight,” she told him, “I can see it in front of us, hanging there, so blue and bright. There is so much water, and the land lies on it like a jewel against a noblewoman’s neck.”

Longing ached in Kubo’s chest, so strong he leaned forward as if he could see it too. His shamisen rattled on his back. “Tell me more,” he pleaded. No matter how much he heard about the earth, every tidbit and description was sacred. He lived in a realm of gods, and yet even a hint of mortality was the most precious thing he could imagine.

The Lady hesitated, and for a moment Kubo worried she would refuse to say anything else. Instead, the words spilled out of her. It sounded more like poetry than any of the stilted, stale compositions the court turned recited.

“Clouds are everywhere, and if you have the eyes to see it the entire atmosphere is aglow with life. It looks like the planet is a gem covered in gauze and fur, and yet it is more beautiful because parts of it are concealed. On the far side, where the light does not touch it yet, you can see the tiniest glimmers of light through the darkness. A pinpoint marks the greatest of cities, and there are dozens of these little dots of brightness scattered around. It seems so small from far away, but for every hairsbreadth of land there are people living there. Dozens, sometimes even hundreds. They are not populous enough to erase the green and golds of the earth though. Forests and deserts and mountains are just smudges from here, hard to distinguish and yet so beautiful from a distance.”

“But you can’t see people,” Kubo said sadly.

Cloth rustled against hair as she shook her head. “No. It is impossible to make out humans from such a distance.”

“They are there, though,” he insisted. “They live and laugh and work. I can’t remember, but I know it. The truth is still the truth even if you don’t say it. You can see them, you just can’t tell that you can. They’re blurry from far away, but they’re still there. I need to see too. Please, ma’am.”

“Little prince-”

He scowled. “Don’t call me that, my name is Kubo.”

“Kubo. The truth exists before you know it, however I must know it to tell you. I’m sorry, there is nothing I can do.”

A furious silence reigned while Kubo tried to formulate some sort of retort. He kept coming up against the stumbling block of reality.

“I just need to know where to look,” he mumbled finally, feeling petulant. “The floor, the ceiling. I don’t know how palaces work. Where do you keep things you don’t want people to find?”

“If you are good at hiding, you’ll put it in the last place they’ll look,” the Lady informed him. Consideration crept like fog into her voice, “If you are unimaginative though… you put it where treasures go.”

At times Kubo thought he heard ideas in words that shouldn’t be there. Even the most subtle of emotions slipped through eventually, and he was getting good at this.Now, anticipation dripped off of her steady, thoughtful breathing, the little noise between the tip of the tongue and the teeth that suggested something was on a very edge of being spoken.

“I do not know much about your grandfather,” she said finally, “But I do know something about how manors are built. How they have always been built. There will be a small room with strong walls, nothing you could magic away or tear through, inside his innermost chambers. Humans use it for sleeping, but we do not sleep. It is where heirlooms are kept, and money. We have no need of either, for we do not buy and we never inherit. However a treasure like the eyes of a child of heaven might be kept there.”

Having said that, she lapsed into silence, which Kubo promptly broke with a crow of delight. “Thank you! Thank you, thank you! I- I think I can use that. I can find a room. That’s easy.”

“It won’t be,” she warned.

“Okay,” he conceded, “But at least I know where to look now. How did you know that about palaces?”

As if puzzled by her own knowledge, she answered, “I… remembered. Some trends on earth are mirrored in the heavens. Usually a few centuries late. I suppose, it was something I knew once.”

Kubo knew better than to make light of something so clearly personal. A memory stolen from the jaws of forced serenity was a powerful thing. He tried to calm down, to be what his aunts would call ‘dignified’.

“Thank you then, lady,” he said in his most serious voice. It felt strange to call her that. It wasn’t a name so much as an absence of one, but very few people had names up here. If he didn’t need to differentiate between them, even grandfather simply called Yukami and Karasu, ‘daughters’.

“Please,” she told him, with a smile between her teeth. “Call me Kaguya. Should you go back to your room now? I don’t want anyone to notice you’re gone.”

He was young, not stupid, whatever his aunts thought. He recognized a request for privacy when he heard it.

Memories, even faint ones, could change you. She needed space, probably. Adults often did.

“Thank you, Lady Kaguya,” he said, and left her to her thoughts. As he retreated, he heard music start up again, tremulous and almost mournful.

 

 

 

They must be near the middle of the lake, or close enough to it, when the kingfisher finally stops and points downward.

Above them, the moon is still distant and distracted. Sariatu glances at it once, before she shuts her eyes, holds her breath, and lets the weight of silk and steel drag her down.

The eyes below need to be seen, she knows that. Therefore not looking is the quickest solution. However the sensation of blindness does not sit easily her heart as she drifts down through the water. She needs to know where the Breastplate is, she needs to know how to get it.

Simply feeling around is dangerous. There are teeth as well as eyes under the water.

She settles for a quick peek, and the first thing that greets her is the golden shine of metal untarnished against the dark green of the lake bottom. Gold may be eternal, but only magic can keep it so untouched by the elements.

Her lungs already protest at the lack of new air, so she shuts her eyes again quickly and swims in the direction of the armor. Progress is slow, she is weighed down by the trappings of her station. Her hair alone is a few pounds waterlogged.

It is cold here, and the pressure of the water against her skin is nearly unbearable. A whisper seems to echo from everywhere, filling her ears with harsh static. The instant she feels the scales and ridges of the armour under her fingertips, she grabs at it, pulls it close and slips it over her head. The Breastplate Impenetrable was made to be worn by mortals, to mold itself to their bodies. For her, it is gracious enough to allow some ease of wear though it is still tight in the chest. Perhaps that’s just the lack of breathing getting to her.

Sariatu is almost ready to count this whole, impulsive venture a success and swim back to the surface when something taps her shoulder.

She spins automatically and her eyes open out of the same instinct. An instant is enough. Bright yellow now floods her vision, and in the middle of that sickly glow is a darkness that seems to suck her in.

The whispering in her ears grows louder as the pupils of the eye constricts. She has just enough time to recognize what’s happening before the trance overtakes her.

Then, she dreams. 

 

 

 

It is soft and warm and painless in the furthest corner of her mind. There is no cold, no fear, no anger. Instead, what replaces it is an overwhelming sense of mourning.

She sees Hanzo.

He is asleep and she is watching him, fond and amazed and horrified at the same time. She is younger now, and humans are not something she understands well. Their needs are hard to anticipate and even harder to comprehend.. Despite the fact that she doesn’t know much about why he sleeps, she knows she likes watching it. He’ll drift off more and more around her lately, clearly having decided that she’s not about to slit his throat. That faith is amusing, if only because she daren’t think about the implications seriously.

So, she sits and hides from the moonlight while he slumbers and fidgets in his sleep. Sometimes words will pass his lips, except they are rarely in any tongue known to men or gods. Lost, vague syllables without meaning, but delivered with such conviction that she tries to draw meaning from them anyways.

When he wakes, he’ll laugh and smile and be back to his usual, untouchable self. He is a hero, brave and bold and gentle. If he wanted, he could challenge the gods. His men would certainly follow him, for he commands an adoration from them she cannot hope to understand. In daylight, he is a warrior and a human. Here and now, in his room at midnight, however, he is hers.

Now, he sighs again, struggling to form words from whatever place humans go when they dream. She leans in to listen. Nonsense or not, she treasures the sound of his voice.

This time, he says something that makes sense.

“Sariatu....”

And now, she is watching someone else sleep. His form is changed, but his voice is the same, sleep blurred and tender. From inside the insect’s carapace she hears her husband’s voice again.

He says her name.

Then they are sitting around a fire, talking and laughing and trying to tell each other stories about the Beetle clan. Little facts stolen from an abyss of forgetfulness. He remembers mushrooms that grew in the forest nearby, she remembers the song birds that would nest in the courtyard trees. In the memories, she does not think much of this. He was a warrior of the clan, he would know the inner workings of the fortress. There is nothing amiss.

Except… when she tries to remember the name of the girl from the nearby village who came and helped her when she was first pregnant and so scared, he gives her an answer that sounds right. When he goes to collect firewood, he hums a song that she can play back to him, note for note.

Hanzo loved his soldiers, yes, but how much could a man-at-arms know?

She is back with her husband, and the sight of his face alone makes her so happy she could cry. There is no need for telling secrets, this alone could carry her to her doom.

(And she is doomed. Some small part of her knows that. A yellow glow suffuses her vision. She is in danger, and every second spent in this strange world conjured up by the eyes is a second closer to her death. The large majority of her being doesn’t care.)

His eyes are dark brown, like their son’s will be. His face is angular and just beginning to show signs of age. He is riding out to battle in the snow, away from the protections she has crafted around this castle. She’s giving him last minute instructions, while his troops mill around them, watching the show.

Finally he swings up on his horse and leans down to smile at her. “See,” he says, with a ridiculous smile, “You miss me already.”

He winks, and everyone laughs, and despite herself she laughs too. It is as much borne of stress as affection. Her defection from the heavens weighs on her mind.

Instinctively, she reaches down to touch her stomach, where a baby grows and kicks. A miracle more potent than any glory of the celestial realm. When she does, she finds nothing but emptiness beneath her hands.

She screams and Hanzo is there again, soothing, comforting, holding her close, but he has more arms than usual and that’s not normal for humans, so she screams some more. The sound is distant and her body isn’t moving the way she wants it to.

Then, something sharp pokes Sariatu in the eye, she blinks, and dream comes crashing down. In the sudden darkness she can be afraid. Remembering what to be afraid of takes a few more seconds, more time than it should. Her grip on her sword is clumsy in the weightlessness underwater, it moves slowly from her sheath and slices through the water at half speed. It connects though, and there is a shriek from all around her as it slices through something and comes out the other side.

Sariatu knows she cannot kill an garden. She’d need a lot more time and some aphids for that. All she can hope to do is flee.

Arms flailing, she reaches for the surface, and the water slowly allows her up. There is no magic now, only muscle and screaming determination. Every inch of her hurts from the cold and all she can remember is a beach and pain and her son’s wails.

With a crash she breaks the water and gulps in a few breaths before she sinks back down again. Now, feeling relatively secure, she can try to use her magic again.

The next time she surfaces, she feels a little less like a half drowned cat and more like someone who fully intended to go under the lake a retrieve a magical object. She lets the waves lift her up, pushes her streaming hair out of her face, and stares up at the stars.

Illuminated in black and white is her kingfisher friend, looking more pleased with themself than she had previously thought possible for an inch high bird made of leaves.

“Thank you,” she whispers once she has her breath back, because she’s certain it was their doing that she isn’t blood on the tide and a body at the bottom of the lake now.

It rustles, settles on her chest, and lets itself dissolve back into wet leaves just as she surrenders to the cold dragging her in. She can only hope her tendency towards sleep magic pulls her back to shore, and not back into the depths.

 

 

 

 

She awakes to a world that jitters. Slowly, she realizes that this is because someone is shaking her.

“Wake up!” Hanzo is telling her, insistently. “Come on, you need to wake up, you have a kid. I can’t take care a kid and we definitely know that Monkey can’t-ow!”

Sariatu hoists her eyelids open with great effort and tries to figure out why she isn’t looking at Hanzo’s face. This one is round, and almost grey in the desaturated light of the night. The helmet if familiar, but too big, the horns reaching too far up. As she tries to gauge their full length her head lolls back and Beetle cradles her even tighter to his chest.

“Careful there,” he says, in Hanzo’s voice. Sariatu just stares. Behind his head there is a backdrop of darkness freckled by stars and the general orientation of gravity suggest that he’s kneeling and holding her. One hand is trailing on the beach, and she can feel dampness there to match the water soaking her entire being. On the other edge of her vision, Monkey’s curious forehead peers in.

All these things are lesser details next to the voice. Beetle hasn’t stopped talking and his words roll over her, dragging her back down.

“What were you thinking? You terrified us! If Hanzo hadn’t warned us you would have drowned.”

“Hanzo-” Sariatu whispers weakly. A bedraggled blur peeks around Beetle’s helmet and waves, cheekily.

Still, the rant continues, “We have a tacit arrangement; I’m supposed to be the impulsive one. You’ve thrown off our entire dynamic. Monkey was heartbroken, we tripped over the fire on the way out, and now there’s water in her fur. You- you really scared us.”

Faint lines appear on Beetle’s face as he frowns and waits for a response. Just in time, Sariatu’s wits start coming back to her. She yanks one hand off the sand to flop onto her chest and confirms that the tightness there is, in fact, the breastplate, checks that she still has the sword. Then she tugs herself away from Beetle’s grip and settles on the ground, slowly pulling herself together, like folding origami out of paper.

When she’s sitting and mostly upright, she takes stock of the situation again.

Beetle and Monkey look awful. They are, as promised, both waterlogged and shivering gently in the night air. Monkey looks especially dejected. There is pondweed tangled in her fur. It looks like they tried to attack the lake, or at least fell in it several times.

They also look worried. She is, technically, the leader of this quest. It’s her job to assuage their fears and convince them that an ill-advised one man attempt on the Garden of Eyes, which has claimed the lives of thousands of heroes to date, was in fact advised.

She clears her throat.

“I’m sorry. That was… reckless. I just needed to feel like I was doing something, anything, for Kubo. The second I knew where the Breastplate Impenetrable was, I reacted. I needed to feel like we were making progress. I shouldn’t have worried you.” The words feel distant, as if someone else is saying them. All she can do is watch Beetle, his face, his expressions.

He smiles, with relief, his teeth gleaming in the moonlight. “Next time,” he advises brightly, “You should wake us up. Seriously, no problem at all. Secret nighttime attack? Down for it. Just give us five minutes warning.”

Monkey grumbles something to the contrary and Beetle laughs.

It’s the laugh that decides it. She knows that laugh. She cannot remember it, already the snippets of truth given by the Garden of Eyes are fading, but she knows it in her heart.

She would say this was cruel even for her family, but all she can feel is endless joy. He’s alive. He’s safe, and happy. He will take care of Kubo when she’s gone.

He does not remember her. She can’t tell him. How could she? They are not the same people they were all those years ago. It would be the ultimate punishment, to leave him with a ghost like that.

Uncertainty is the thing about humanity she has always liked the least, and now Sariatu has no idea what to do. She is still dazed as Beetle pulls her to her feet (he is still so kind) and helps her walk over to the crumpled mound of her robes a few yards up the beach. With shaking hands she pulls them on, one by one, trying to buy time to think and knowing she can’t possibly hope to.

The problem is, she loves him. She did, desperately and tragically. She does, she thinks, in a quieter way. They have only known each other again for a little while, and yet she had fallen in love with him the first time in one night. He makes her feel a little safer, a little more secure, and he makes her smile. Sometimes, if the stars are right, she almost feels like her old self again.

For all the things her father was wrong about, he did have one point. Love can make you foolish. It can make you overplay your hand. Sariatu does not regret the life she has lived, but if they had been a little more careful… if they had managed to stay safe, perhaps it could have turned out better. This time, she can be cautious.

They traipse back their cave, Hanzo (her husband) promising to try to restart the fire and Monkey sticking close to him. Sariatu suspects she is being slighted on purpose, to try to teach her a lesson about running off and jumping into lakes, but she likes that they’re getting along.

As they walk, she looks up at the sky. The stars are all on parade, making their way down the streaming path of the galaxy. Low on the horizon, the waning moon winks maliciously. Sariatu can’t shake the feeling that it’s looking at her.

Surely, they’re running out of time.

 

 

 

Kubo prepared for his assault on his grandfather’s quarters like other people might prepare for a war. It wasn’t a war he wanted, he was aiming for more of a heist, however it paid to be prepared.

His troops stood on the floor in front of him, rows of little paper mercenaries, agents of righteous eye-remittance. Agents who crinkled gently as their folded heads turned up to look at him.

One last check of his gear later, and he felt almost ready to set out on his mission. He had a sword. He had paper to spare, bargained and wheedled out of Auntie Karasu. (He was getting good at dealing with her.) He had his shamisen and bachi. Between all of them, he felt a little overburdened. The sword hilt and the shamisen drum banged against each other if he didn’t keep his arm between them.

He patted the pile of silks at his feet, then unhooked his cumbersome feather cape and draped it over the mountain range of finery. From a distance, perhaps it could look like a small boy sleeping. 

Now, he turned to his allies and struck a the faintest chord to bring them all to life.

“I am going to need all of you to be on your very best behavior,” he said, still strumming gently on the highest notes he knew “I know I can’t order you, but I can ask. I am asking you to help me. This needs to go perfectly, or I might not get another chance.”

“Yoriji, you stay here and watch my exit. If anyone comes in looking for me-” Kubo wasn’t sure what to ask of the little samurai. If anyone came looking for him, Yoriji probably wouldn’t be able to stop them. “See if you can escape and warn me. Bat, you will stay nearby and help him get the message out.”

Wings fluttered, which Kubo chose to take as an affirmative.

“Tiger, you come with me and watch my back, since you’re fast enough to keep up.” Tigers were easy, and they had good balance compared to some of the less wieldy figures Kubo knew how to make. He was unsure of how long his power would last, especially if his control slipped or he had to stop playing. Yoriji stayed together well enough overnight, but he was just one little man. “Monkey, sit on my shoulder and be my eyes, please. Tell me if there is something I am missing.”

This one was a long shot. He hadn’t the time to test out whether his creations could see or think without him. Sometimes they showed little signs of life, yet only practice could tell him if it was enough to let them think. The line between autonomy and automaton was a thin one, he still wasn’t sure where many of the residents of the Moon Kingdom fell in relation to it.

Thankfully, a little weight tugged on his sleeve, tiny paws scampering up to his shoulder, and the faintest pressure settled next to his ear. Kubo felt more comfortable with the Monkey at his side. He played a little faster, note after note energizing him as much as it did his companions.

“Butterfly, you will be in charge of the high up places. Look for shelves and other things I can’t reach. Spider, you climb the walls and find what is there. Chicken… you can probably sit this one out.”

Paper skittering and flapping ensued as they took up their assigned locations. The oversized chicken at Kubo’s feet bawked dejectedly. Gingerly, still strumming with one hand, he knelt to pat it on the head. He hadn’t quite been think when he’d made it. It had just felt right.

He straightened, made sure his self-made friends were close to him, and slowly, carefully played the pleading song to make the walls let him through. Ancient glue unbound with a creak. Paper struggled, then gave in to the magic and folded before him, until only the wooden framework remained. Kubo felt his way to the biggest opening and ducked through. Once he was sure all his helpers were through as well- and that the chicken was decidedly inside- he played the wall back shut. It complied, grudgingly, but it couldn’t argue with a prince.

Kubo stepped lightly. Someone was outside his door, some blank-eyed, serene nymph of the heavens. He’d told them he was going to play music quietly until he fell asleep. If he was lucky, they wouldn’t notice how far away the playing was getting. They weren’t very good at making judgement calls.

Ceremonies for the waning moon would continue for another few hours. He had barely ducked out by threatening to collapse again. Grandfather certainly wouldn’t leave his precious, perfect, empty court. His aunts would stay as well, he hoped. The palace would be quiet, quiet enough to maybe pull off a heist.

He should have waited longer, more than a few days after talking to Lady Kaguya, but the longer he delayed the more anxious he became. It was like ripping off a scab, you just had to do it at once and hope it didn’t bleed everywhere.

Of course, certain areas of wisdom held that you didn’t have to pull at scabs. Kubo was almost certain they were faulty. Some things pried at the mind if you left them alone.

He slid down the hall on socked feet, paper rustling around him, playing as soft and furious as he could manage. When he reached the sliding door to his grandfather’s rooms, he let a long note hang in the air while he shoved them open, wincing instinctively as he did.

It hurt, but it had to be done.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annotations  
> 1.) Totally irrelevant to how the story ended up, because this is Fantasy World, but in my original huge google doc of research I have a map trying to line up KatTS landmarks to actual Japanese topography, just to get a general sense of what I was looking at. Long Lake's equivalent was Biwa Lake and I used that when I needed some reference.  
> 2.) At this point you might be noticing a lot of repetition and echoing over the various chapters. I promise, that's mostly on purpose. I wanted a sort of song-like rhythm to the story, and a more dream-like feel than the straight up heroes narrative of Kubo.  
> 3.) Once again, drawing from some elements of Heian architecture, this time the concept of the nurigome or a more solidly walled room in the western wing used for storing heirlooms and as a sleeping chamber by the ruler of the house. The Moon King... is not an inventive god. He likes to have rules, and what are your grandson's eyeballs if not heirlooms? They definitely come from your heir.  
> 4.) A lot of the origami figures Kubo makes in the movie would be very complicated with regular origami, so for his heist I tried to stick with a few basic origami staples and some call backs. Boy's about to pull of a heist, he can't get too fancy.  
> Also, I have updated my playlist on playmoss with more songs for this and the previous chapter.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, thanks for sticking with me and thank you so much for your support. Fair warning, this one gets a wee bit dark and kind of make me uncomfortable writing it just in the eye trauma department.

Sliding and sashaying, long, low motions that kept him close to the ground and didn’t run the risk of stepping on any noisy tripping hazards, Kubo moved into the ante-chamber. It was a familiar place, he had spent long hours there, sitting, twiddling his thumbs, playing with whatever knife or rock his aunts thrust at him to distract him, waiting to be paid attention to. There was no way he’d missed anything here; he had more or less bounced off the walls in every conceivable way. On one memorable occasion he’d bounced through them.

On the other hand… he knew what his family found funny. Leaving some precious treasure hidden in plain sight when he had none would be just like them. Kubo turned his head towards the gentle flapping of paper wings.

“Can you check the ceiling, please?” he asked, “And all the places on the walls too high for me to reach?”

His friends skittered and fluttered to do so, leaving Kubo with the floor and his thoughts. Sometimes, in the middle of a room, he felt untethered. There was nothing but air against his back and the floor at his feet, no landmarks or guiding points. Of course he knew exactly how many steps it would take to reach each side of the long room, he’d memorized it long ago. That intellectual knowledge of his surroundings was cold comfort against the nagging worry that something had changed, that he had turned the wrong way, gotten mixed up, and wouldn’t realize it until it was too late.

There was a perception gap in how he had to take in the world now that made it a little harder to know with certainty that he knew where he was going. It was not significant and it grew smaller every day, but it was just enough to make him scared. His playing faltered, just for a moment. It was hard to keep it up, especially plucking. The pads of his fingers now had canyons scored into them where the strings had pressed.  

Eight legs clambered up his back, Kubo nearly shrieked on impulse, until he remembered that the spider was his ally. It settled on his shoulder solidly, its meaning clear. There was nothing in the narrow letter box of a room. They had to move on.

He shuddered and counted his steps to the room where Grandfather usually received him. A painted star map screen gave way under his fingers letting him into an empty space that still smelled like winter lakes and old people.

This one was even more memory laden. Kubo stepped on mats softer and thick like woven sleep, and stopped instinctively where he usually sat, across from his grandfather, distant and aloof as the moon itself. How many hours had he spent here, playing music until his human hands ached and he yawned so wide Grandfather cringed away out of sheer good taste?

It hadn’t been all bad though. Grandfather wasn’t always nice, but he was usually more mannerly about it than his aunts were. They were angry and volatile, Grandfather was merely predictably cold. And sometimes, in those long hours, especially very early on, Kubo had almost felt loved.

Last week, he’d been sitting here, feeling like his feathered cape was trying to trap him in an itchy hell, fidgeting and messing up the notes and wishing he’d eaten more for breakfast.

Grandfather had reached across the space between him, adjusted his fingering on his shamisen, and said mildly, “If you applied yourself a little more, it would be perfect. As it is, I think your playing is very good. You have such an ear for long songs, grandson.”

Kubo had smiled so wide his cheeks had felt like they were going to fall off, and for a moment, all the awfulness hadn’t mattered.

On his shoulder, the origami monkey made a comforting paper noise and nuzzled his ear, forcing Kubo to remember that he was on an indeterminate time limit. He kept moving forward, his instincts fighting him every second. Here was the place where grandfather usually sat, an almost noticeable indent in the floor. Here were other markers of his presence, his shamisen set to the side (it twanged when Kubo’s foot hit it), a low desk, a writing set. He moved slowly so he wouldn’t knock anything over, one hand out in front of him, groping desperately until he reached the far wall.

All he could play now was the same note, repeated over and over again, a low insistent thrum that matched the creep of his paper friends following them. They only moved when the music hung in the air, and when he thought about it, it was a _little_ creepy.

It wasn’t a screen of fine paper or slats of wood that his questing fingers finally found. It was a wall, surprisingly solid and made of plaster, cool and smooth under his palm. He walked his hand along the wall, looking for some entrance or purchase in the surface, but none was apparent. Only slight variations of texture, bumps and ridges, just faint enough that it took Kubo a while to realize that it was a mural painted there.

He stopped playing.

Paper fell inert around him. It was a risky move, but easier that playing blind charades with them to figure out what was in front of him. Using both hands, he felt up and down the wall, looking for patterns and places where the paint stopped and started. When that was enough, he stepped in even closer, over the frozen figures of his former helpers, and pressed his entire body against plaster. Touch, smell, taste was probably inadvisable but he was tempted to try it.

There was a single, amorphous, painted figure there,the exact details of which he could not make out. Around it, the plaster was blank, aside from a few details scattered about. The image was huge, starting below him and reaching up farther than he could reach.

It was probably very beautiful and intricate, all things were here, which made what Kubo was about to do to very regrettable.

His hand went to his waist and the too big sword fastened to his belt, then he thought better of it. Maybe you didn’t always have to stab things. He wasn’t his aunts, and he didn’t want to be.

What would his mother have done?

With a swinging gesture perhaps a tad bit more dramatic than necessary, he started playing again, a fast paced, loud song that demanded motion. Tiger, monkey, butterfly, and spider all immediately sprung back to life.

“Find a way in,” he said, “Or I’ll try to slice the wall open with my sword and I don’t actually think that’ll work.”

 

 

 

It takes Sariatu a while to corner the red paper facsimile of her now not late husband. Not-Hanzo is difficult to separate from Beetle-Hanzo’s side.

She’d ended up having to let Miss Monkey in on her plan,, or at least some tiny part of it, and while she weakly convinced Beetle to go scouting for signs of the helmet nearby (and desperately pretended his good natured protests weren’t Hanzo to the core) Monkey plucked Not-Hanzo from Beetle’s carapace and held him prisoner until Sariatu’s once and arguably current husband had left to check out the nearby terrain.

“You knew!” Sariatu says accusingly as Monkey puts Paper Hanzo down on a rock. “You knew who he was all along.”

He folds his arms, silent as the written word but just as damning.

“You should have told me,” Sariatu says softly. Monkey is looking at her in confusion now. Monkey doesn’t know. She’ll have to be told and that will be a production and a half.

Not Hanzo just stares silently, as if to say, “How?” Then, he points his sword in the direction Hanzo went.

Sariatu stares, sun struck and slowly assembling a teetering tower of thought upon which to pin her hopes. “You did bring me to him?” she says, uncertainly, trying to remember. Hanzo had found Hanzo and Hanzo had found him. That was how it had gone, wasn’t it?

Her paper prisoner nods. Monkey chirrups a question, which Sariatu waves off softly, “Later, I’ll explain,” she promises, and returns to her fractured interrogation.

(Who is interrogating who at this point is entirely up for debate.)

“You found my husband, but I made you to find the armour,” she says, sitting now so she’s at eye level with her paper adversary in this game of wits. He looks as windblown as she feels. Sturdy though his paper is, the folds are starting to wear and one of the horns of his helmet is crooked. She knows what it is like, to be made of magic and slightly broken. She probably should not fault him for his rebellions against his creator, and she _doesn’t_. All she needs is the truth, preferably spoon fed to her.

He shakes his head, then makes a tries a complicated bit of sign language before giving up and returning to simple nos.

“I thought I made you to find the armour.”

Another shake of the head.

Sariatu tries to remember the dreamlike haze that had brought him to life. There had been a maple tree, sunshine streaming through red leaves onto red paper, and magic, more of it than she should have spared. There had been a wish, one that had come from the very center of her soul.

She had wanted…

Well, she had wanted the armour, yes, but that was a means to an end. She wanted her family back.

Intent has power, and so do dreams. The wide circle of paper around her every other morning proves that much.

He _has_ brought Hanzo back to her. That is something. It’s still dismaying to be so very wrong for so very long in the face of so many facts.

She shuts her eyes, and when she opens them, Monkey has loped off and returned with a handful of provisions, obviously working on the general principle that food never goes wrong in a crisis. Sariatu turns her down, because she still has a lot of thinking to do, and not much time to do it in.

Beetle ( _Hanzo_ ) will come back and she’ll need to know what to do with him. The idea is like a mountain, insurmountable alone, manageable with help.

First, she has to fill Monkey in.

Once that is done, then explained again for greater clarity, she turns to her team. Somehow, when you remove Beetle from the equation, it becomes even more ragtag.

“He doesn’t remember anything.” Sariatu says, staring at the clear, stomach churning blue of the sky beyond the treeline, “My family must have cursed him. I… I don’t know what to tell him. I don’t know if I can tell him. It might hurt him. He might just forget right away. The terms of a curse can be difficult. But he deserves to know.”

Explanations provided, Not-Hanzo is sitting peaceably on his rock, happy to not contribute. Monkey just looks very confused.

“More than that, Kubo deserves to know. If I don’t make it and Beetle takes care of him, he should know it is his father looking after him. They’ll need to be told.”

She stares. Monkey and Paper Hanzo stare back, until she realizes that they can’t talk and, as previously demonstrated, their signing capabilities are limited.

Under the aching blue sky, Sariatu gives up. She collapses back to the ground in a billow of robes, and finds that it is hard to slouch in the Breastplate Impenetrable without it digging into her sides. Deprived of the small luxury of bad posture, she sits rests her elbows on the rock that Not-Hanzo is on and lays her head down against the warm surface.

“I’m just going to have to hold my sisters down until they lift the curse,” she decides, after a while. “Or I could talk with them about it. If they think it will hurt me, they might just do it themselves. They know better than anyone how much the truth can hurt.”

It is cowardice to not tell him now and she knows it. Sometimes, cowardice is another word for caution, for shying away from that which you are too weak to handle.

Monkey presses a shelled walnut to her lips and, reluctantly, Sariatu parts them to let herself be fed. Kubo had done that as well, tried to feed her when he wasn’t sure what else to do. It was human, or at least alive. Earthen, as much as anything could be.

Sunlight in her hair and meat of the walnut still between her teeth, she sits, and lets herself float in a few stolen moments of ignorance.

Beetle comes back. He’s very loud, she can’t miss him, but just in case, Monkey shakes her shoulder gently, stirring her into alertness.

“What are you doing?” Beetle asks, looking at them with a confused smile. “Some sort of secret meeting I’m not allowed to know about?”

She has to squint to look up at him as he moves to stand over them. The sun behind him frames his stupidly round face, rays breaking on the quiver slung over his back, softening the disquietingly insectoid lines of his body. He is just an outline, a shadow of a person, and she is in his shadow.

Then he crouches, and she can see his red face properly.

“Absolutely,” she says. “More of a support group then anything. You have a lot of bad habits. And you smell.”

Little Mari, who still apparently believed that the best way to tell someone you liked them was to push them in the river, could have done better. Beetle reachs out a hand to gather up Not-Hanzo, still a bit off put but not suspicious. “You stole my only friend too. That’s just cruel.”

“He had things to contribute,” Sariatu claims, and the paper man does not argue with her.

“Well, I hope you weren’t complaining about me too much, my lady. I did save your life last night, that has to count for something, and I found a bush of berries that I’m pretty sure aren’t poisonous!”

Sariatu isn’t touching the berries issue. She’s had enough food for the morning. They candeal with the messy human things again later in the day. “You and Monkey saved my life,” she says, just for the sake of arguing.

It’s a bit like setting two walls fighting each other, futile and not fun to watch. Beetle frowns. “I mean, I did most of the heavy lifting. I’m a better swimmer.”

“We’ll say it was a joint effort,” Sariatu concedes, touching Miss Monkey’s hand. She deserves some appreciation. She has been so much help, with walking and moving and eating and finding bushes that _definitely_ weren’t poisonous.

She regrets it immediately. Beetle grabs any social cue he sees and runs with it, which means he promptly puts his hand on the pile as well, and squeezes, gently.

It was so easy to banter and play. It was so easy for her to forget, to pretend she wasn’t looking at the love of her life across from her. The heavens had shaken with her love for this man, and gods had trembled.

Forgetting only let you get away with it for so long before there way a price.

As if she has been burned, Sariatu snatches her hand away and holds it close to her chest, to the smooth scale of the armour there and the safety of personal space.

In the spiderweb stillness afterwards, she and Hanzo make eye contact. Then, because he had never been once for standing still, he starts trying to fix things.

“Sorry, sorry!” he says quickly, “Did I hurt you? I really didn’t mean to do that, Sariatu, I’m sorry.”

“It’s… fine,” she tells him, unable to come up with a convincing lie, or really any lie at all.

“Did you get pinched by the joints of my armour? I did that to Monkey last week and she slapped me, which is certainly the least interesting reason I’ve ever been slapped by someone. Do you need a bandage-”

Monkey, blessed Monkey, pulls Beetle forcibly back down to the ground. The ‘be quiet’ is more implied, but never the less, taken to heart.

“I’m sorry,” Sariatu says finally. “I overreacted. You’ve been very kind to me, Beetle.” Then, because she cannot help herself;  “Can I ask you something?”

“Of course.”

“Were you married, before the battle that took your memories from you? Can you recall a wife, children? I don’t want you to be making commitments to me if you might have a family you can’t remember.”

For a second, absolute confusion passes over his face, followed by an eerie introspection she knows all too well. “I- I don’t think I was. I can’t remember my parents, or a wedding. I think if I had someone to go back to, I would have tried to find them. All I can really recall if my clan, my duty.” He looks at her, earnest and shining and just a pinch rakish. “I can’t remember much, but all of it leads to you.”

 

 

 

 

Their wedding hadn’t been a wedding so much as an elopement, in his defense. For all the divine drama that was to follow, the story itself was simple and so old.

Fall in love, get pregnant, hide from the consequences.

Marriage had been more of an afterthought and by the time they’d gotten around to it they were already living together. Everyone at his castle knew her name. Her family was looking for her. Every morning she threw up and every afternoon when the sun was high she got dizzy.

It wasn’t romantic.

Still, in her fading memory she cannot help but romanticize it.

Hanzo had proposed to her a dozen times when they were young and in love, drunk on each other and all the fleeting delights humanity had to offer. She had turned him down every time. It was better to be the moon maiden he met at twilight, the woman who left feathers in his room and sometimes sparring bruises down his body.

Then it had all come to a head rather too quickly, no chances for weddings.

Hanzo’s retainers tell her, in her dim recollections, that they are practically wed.

“A man and a woman live together and their parents don’t object, it’s done,” an old lady folding linens advises serenely, and Sariatu wisely keeps her mouth shut.

“No point in a procession or a ceremony, if there’s a baby to prove you’re together,” someone else grey and wrinkly tells her. “Even the gods have to recognize that.”

She very distinctly does not want the gods to recognize that, and she says as much. The g-word in general no longer feels safe, with the specter of her father and sisters over her shoulder. The point, however, is made, even if it turns her stomach.

Still, it feels like there should be something else.

She doesn’t have much else to do, cooped up with only the whisper of a child in her belly to occupy her thoughts. Hanzo has always been the one for grand romantic gestures, but this time she wants to be the one to surprise him.

(It startles her, how clear her memory is. She treasures it. Out of all the things to remember, this is perhaps the third most important.)

Night is the best time, when he is home and her head is clear. She corners him on a walkway once everyone has gone to bed, and he backs away, instinctively. “You have that look in our eye, my love.”

“Let’s get _married_.”

Slowly, his fear breaks into fearlessness. “I mean, I suppose if you insist.”

The temple where they first met is a sacred place, for more than one reason. Ceremonies are held here, advice is sought. Ancestors are consulted, babies presented. It is a place for gods, yes, but more than that, it is a place for humans. If a higher power must be reached, and she supposes it must though frankly the rearing remnant of divinity in her insists that she _is_ the higher power, it is best that it is one of the human kind.

Besides, it will make Hanzo so happy.

They need an umbrella to get there without risking the ever vigilant moon seeing them. The vulnerability of being outside the castle brings with it a certain thrill, egged on by the joy of being back on such holy ground. At night, the temple is quiet. Sariatu thinks she can still hear the echos of their duel in the rafters.

She sets up all the right purification rituals, paper the way her father taught her to fold it, while Hanzo sits at his family altar, quiet as the grave, arranging flowers and some small bits of food. Then, just to keep her hands busy, she folds some more paper. Cranes have been on her mind lately. There are stories of cranes turning into humans and marrying human men. Though she already knows the answer, she wonders if they ever missed the sky.

Humanity is more than she could have ever imagined. She does not regret it. Sometimes though, sometimes she is scared.

When she has a dozen paper cranes in a circle around her, she finally makes herself stop and turns to Hanzo. He looks as uncertain as her. “What now? We have no priest, no monk. I can’t remember the right words for a wedding.”

“Neither can I,” she admits, “But we don’t need that. All we need is this. I thought, we’d ask your family for permission and then we’d make a promise. Or something like that.”

Hanzo glaces at the still stone altar and stares her dead in the eyes. “What if they say _no_?” he whispers, in a tone of faux horror.

Sariatu looks right back. “I guess I have to go back to the moon.”

A hint of nervousness creeps into his eyes, and he breaks off the starting contest. “High stakes then. Alright,” he clears his throat, pretends to light the brazier of incense they forgot to bring and begins.

“Mother, father, grandmother, grandfather, all the rest of my assorted aunts and uncles and grandparents, I can’t remember all of you, this is the woman I love. She’s from the moon. You may recognize her because she tried to kill me that one time. I promise, she has been reformed since then.”

She throws a paper crane at him.

“Mostly reformed. I adore her anyway. She’s smart and kind and funny, and so talented. She can beat me at go, cards, guessing games… just about everything except archery. She’s from a good family, even if they probably hate us now. We’re going to have a child together, and we would like to get married, with your permission. Fair warning, if you say no, she will have to go back to the moon.”

Hanzo sighs softly, “She is the future of our clan. Our child is the future of our clan, and I so wish you had a chance to meet her.”

There is nothing, no response from the stone, no indication of anyone listening. Sariatu has never had ancestors to talk to, so she doesn’t know how this is supposed to work, but she feels like something more should be happening. Hanzo is unperturbed. Her puts a hand on her shoulder.

“Your turn.”

“Me? What am I supposed to say?” They’re his dead relatives, not hers. She doesn’t even know anyone dead, other than people she killed.

“Just talk to them. Please?”

It’s impossible for her to say no to his smile.

Hanzo’s family died when he was young. Humans kill each other all the time. He talks about them fondly, rarely, and mostly to people he knows well. This, she senses, is something human she should not mess up.

“Ah-” she begins, carefully, “I come here not as family, but as a supplicant. I know you must be hesitant to have me. I would be hesitant to have me too. But Hanzo is- I love him, more then plants love the sun. He showed me worlds I never saw before and I have seen universes.” She bows her head. “Say no, and we’ll leave, and have this child, and nothing will change to the sight of the world. There are worlds beyond that which is seen though, and I want something more than what is simply on the surface with your son. I think he wants that too. It’s an honour to finally meet you all, officially.”

She sits there, stiff as a board, until a sudden gust of wind runs through the temple, tugging at Sariatu’s hair and Hanzo’s beard and he smiles so wide, “I think they like you,” he beams, and this is what passes for magic to humans. It’s small. Somehow, that does not make it feel any less magical.

“Now for that promise?” he says once he’s done hugging her. “I don’t suppose you had any ideas.”

“I don’t know how weddings work,” Sariatu tells him, picking up a white crane and toying with it. She wishes she had a sword on her, but that had seemed too much like asking for another brawl and apparently those weren’t recommended for pregnant women.  

“Yes, you’ve made that _very_ clear.”

“And love is still very new to me,” Sariatu continues, unperturbed by the witty comments. They’re a hazard, when dealing with Hanzo. She half suspects he thinks the same way about her. “I know about stars though. I know all the articulations of the heavens, and I know some of what you see as one star on earth might be two, or three, or four, all clustered together. I know about meteor showers and falling stars. So much of existence seems to involve things running into each other. I know I was so much different before I ran into you.”

“This is my promise to you. I promise that I stay with you, and love you, and raise our children with you, until we are no longer able. I promise to always tell you the truth, even when you’re being stupid, and never go easy on you when we spar, and only complain about your snoring when you’re not in the room. I promise to be human for you, to do my best by your family name, by your clan, by your responsibilities, and try not to bring more trouble down on you than I already have. I want to be married to you Hanzo. I still have no idea what that means down here, but I’m willing to give it shot.”

The the shadows of the temple, his hair looks streaked with grey. He looks older than he is, and he’s getting old, he’s changing every day. She’s shocked, constantly, at how fast humans age.

“Sariatu,” he says, plucking the crane from her hands and putting it on the altar, an offering and sacrifice because now she doesn’t know what to do with her hands. He fixes that by holding them in his.

“I’ll admit, I was a little confused when you said you wanted to get married. I mean, we have so much, we have a kid on the way! This is… amazing. You are so much more than you realize you are. You think you don’t understand love sometimes, you pretend that it’s still a mystery to you, but it’s not. You’re the most loving person I’ve ever met. I want to be married to you. I’ve wanted to be married to you- well, not since you tried to kill me, but close. Every morning, waking up and seeing you, I feel married to you. Every time I see you bossing my army around, I feel married to you. Not to devalue all of this, but I feel like we’ve been married for months and every moment of it has been a miracle. I want to keep marrying you every day until we both die or your father kills us. That sound good?”

She wants to start crying, because he already is. The cranes and shide she folded lie abandoned around them, the evergreen branches and flowers picked on the way and carefully placed on the altar by Hanzo already being blown onto the ground.

Then they…

Then….

She can’t remember how it ends. (Perhaps that’s because it hasn’t yet.)

 

 

 

It took a few minutes of frantic playing before they found a way in that didn’t involve breaking down the walls, and when Tiger clawed on the edge of his pants, Kubo found that he was sweating with exertion. He’d played for hours on end before, had told stories and played and done magic all afternoon, but trying to control multiple forms in a strange environment without any visual reference was proving tricky.

A shamisen only had three strings. To get a lot of noise out of it, you had to _work_.

He let the song slow down some, imagined this was an emotional scene. A hero was creeping closer to the truth, the suspense was building, shuddering up the long wooden body of the instrument. Though it wasn’t his, the one his mother had taught him on, he’d grown fond of it.

Following the tugging and faint papery shoves of his makeshift eyes was slow. Not tripping was a much bigger concern than time at the moment, and he progressed carefully, letting the music and the tiny  hands and pincers pulling at his hair and clothes drag him along, like a leaf in the river. Left, to the side, through a sliding door he had to shoulder open, and into another narrow, hallwaylike space where the air was closed. Just to check, he let his path drift to the side, until he ran into a wall.

The space was mostly bare, as far as he could tell, but there wasn’t time to check every inch of it. Monkey and Butterfly and the rest were pulling him forward still, past the place where grandfather’s office stopped.

Now, the music picked up, and Kubo knew it was matching his racing heart. He could feel it, in the soles of his feet and the back of his head and especially his chest which hurt. He was too young to die of sickness of the heart, like old men did at times, but right now it wouldn’t have surprised him.

Auntie Karasu’s heartbeat slow. He knew because he’d asked her once, after sword practice, when he was out of breath and shaking and she still sounded spring fresh. She’d paused in that way that meant she was looking at him funny, and then said her heart was never faster than it needed to be. Gods’ never were.

She’d shown him too, had taken his hand and held it to her pale, cold neck, and no matter how hard he tried, he’d never been able to find more than the faintest pulse. It had been confusing, and a little upsetting in light of revelations involving elixirs and his own eventual fate. He’d gotten upset, and she’d sat with him stroking his hair until he could pretend it was okay.

Mom had been warm. Kubo couldn’t remember if she’d had a heartbeat, but he bet she had. It was a very low bar for a mother, a living heart, and he had to believe she met it.

They turned, walked a little further, going faster now, all in thrall to the music.

A tugging on the back of his head was the first warning to stop, followed by the hard, flat surface he almost stepped into. Kubo pulled up short, strings twanging, and his friends rustled apologetically, then fell silent until he took up the song again.

With one hand, he plucked, with the other, he explored the door in front of him.

It was simple. Opulent as well, probably, all polished wood that smelled of oils, smooth and flat and perfect. As far as Kubo had figured out so far, the general ethos of the Moon was this: If you can do it perfectly, do that and nothing else. If you can’t do it perfectly, overcompensate.

This, like most things in grandfather’s personal domain, veered more towards perfection. It was the essence of a door. It was wood. It was solid. Every square line was in place, every surface as flawless as a mirror. Nothing else was needed.

It didn’t seem to be locked. Was there any need for locks in a place that was immaculate? He had to trust that Grandfather didn’t think so.

Slowly, Kubo pried the door open, alert for traps or tricks or alarms. All he could play now were rote tunes, things he knew by heart. The scales his mother had taught him when he was young, up and down and back up again. The songs Grandfather had showed him, slow and somber and stripped down.

His companions skittered and flew ahead of him, and they didn’t die. They didn’t come back either, even as increasingly insistent music sprang from the shamisen, bidding them back. They were still _there_ , he could still feel them, tethered to his soul as if by long pieces of string, only they’d been distracted by something.

Kubo didn’t dither for a second. He let the music fall silent, felt the taut connections branching off into the room in front of him and back, back, back to his own bedroom snap. Hands held out in front of his face, protecting and warding and seeking all at once, he strode forward.

 _Mother, Father_ , he thought desperately, _please, help me_ . _Help me find what I need._

One step. Two step. Three step. Four. Five. Six- he stumbled, fell to his knees in front of a low table, more an altar than anything. Clustered around it were the still figures of his dormant assistants, sleeping now. They’d found something.

Hope was like saliva sometimes. It pooled in your mouth, heavy and kind of gross. He swallowed it as he scrabbled at the table. There were swords, he shoved those aside, and they hit the floor with a sickening crash. There were other shapes he couldn’t puzzle out, all laid out neatly on the long surface. Whatever order there was, Kubo didn’t care about it. If it wasn’t eye shaped, he cast it aside. Further and further he reached, until, on a plinth, his hands found something worn and soft.

Embroidery, as well known to him as the shape of his own face, registered to his fingers, and before he knew what he was doing, Kubo pulled the bundle into his lap.

As he did, two small, distinctive thumps followed, the sound of two objects, round and light, hitting the ground, followed by the worrying threat of rolling, the click of hard surface against hard surface. He followed the noises with his hands, throwing his whole body behind the desperate lean. On his side on the floor, the strange, familiar bundle of clothing back with the lower half of his body, he searched the floor for eyes.

The tip of his forefinger found one and he pulled it into his palm. It was small, and glassy, like an orb of alabaster or a large marble. His other hand found the next one a second later, hiding against the table leg, and then they were both in his possession, both his again.

He lay there, panting, then slowly sat back up and held his hard won gains carefully, as if they might break. Eyes were fragile, weren’t they? He remembered them being a lot squishier too. Maybe being out of his head had changed them, as being away from home had changed him.

There was only one way to really tell, wasn’t there?

Time was running out. He wasn’t sure how long it had been now, how long it would be until his aunts of grandfather came looking for him.

He tore his blindfold off and flung it away. The sunken baskets where his eyelids now stretched over empty sockets were always upsetting to touch, they felt wrong, and he didn’t quite have the muscles left to open them. There were scars, newer on one side, old and stretched and faded on the other, where his eyes had been torn out. Given the damage his aunts had done to his face, it was impressive that they’d managed to keep his eyes intact.

Pulling open the eyelid to expose the empty socket was gruesome and painful, but he could do it, and if he held it open with one hand and tried to shove the eye in with the other…

It wouldn’t fit. More than that, it hurt to try. The cold, glass of his eyeball no longer wanted to make nice with the flesh of his face, the roughly healed scar tissue didn’t want to part to let it in. Hot tears leaking from tear ducts which apparently had to stay functional when everything else didn’t, made things a little easier. With them as a sort of watery grease, he could almost shove his eye back in place, and pull his eyelids around it. He had to hold it in, but it was there, pressing against his skull and it was _pointless_.

His eyesight did not come back. Neither did his memories. He tried to put the other eye in, but he couldn’t do that and hold the first eye in place. It slipped out, into his lap and the pile of cloth there, and Kubo remembered the robe.

Tears still running down his cheeks, he held the mysterious garment up, as if he could inspect it, and then draped it over his face and found it smelled exactly like he expected it to. It smelled like home, like smoke and dirt and river water, like the sea outside his doorstep, like the village on the edge of his memories. He turned it over and over in his hands, until he found the larger, raised pattern of embroidery on the back and traced it. Something with lots of legs and spiky bits, a spider perhaps. No, he knew it, it was a beetle.

“Father,” Kubo whispered, and hugged his home tight. His eyes, his awful, frozen eyes, sat forgotten. He did not think he could save them. A thing once changed could not be unchanged so easily. It didn’t matter. He had a scrap of memory and now he knew he could not let it go.

He cried until his aunts came and found him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annotations  
> 1\. With the Moon Kingdom it's a constant struggle between more being better and less being better. It's definitely fancy, but the closer you get to the Moon King's private spaces the more minimalist it gets. He likes things just so. As they say, minimalism is the new ostentation and that was definitely true in ancient Japan. If you could afford to have lots of big empty spaces and a clean sparse aesthetic it meant you had cash. Luckily Kubo isn't too observant so I don't have to describe too much of it.   
> 2\. The big thing with research this chapter was the wedding. I wanted to combine historical traditions, and Shinto and Buddhist faith with the sense of worldbuilding we got from the movie itself, to create something unique and suited to Hanzo and Sariatu's situation. Since ancestry is a big thing, and Hanzo is mentioned visiting a temple, I thought to try to pull those strings together. Asking permission from family is obviously important, and if that family is dead it could bring in a religious element.   
> 3\. Symbolism is also important here! They go to the temple at night, under an umbrella, logically to hide from the Moon King but also to mirror Shinto traditions. The paper folding Sariatu does is heavily inspired by actually wedding traditions, both religious and secular, as is the offering of branches. The theme of cranes is one I've wanted to get into for a while, and the story of the Crane Bride is probably one she'd sympathize with greatly.  
> 3\. Not as much an issue of research, but as I was writing the last scene I realized it was a giant Coraline reference, so thanks Laika. You did this to me.


	9. Chapter 9

 

“ _Kubo._ ”

He didn’t answer. He _refused_ to answer. Yukami spoke again, more sharply, precise as her sword.

“Child. _What have you done_ ?” she demanded, sending chips of ice into Kubo’s heart.  
  
Karasu didn’t even wait for him to answer. “You’re ruining everything!” she raged on. “Just like your mother, selfish and ungrateful.”  
  
Kubo’s hands, still folded in his father’s robe, twisted into fists. “My mother wasn’t selfish!” he said, hoarse but loud. “Wanting to be loved isn’t selfish. Wanting the truth isn’t selfish.”  
  
“We loved you!” Karasu insisted, and Kubo heard the past tense there, the conditional.  
  
His hands had moved to behind his back now, searching the floor there for anything to grab onto, to use. His inert origami friends crumpled under his grasping fingers, then more solid objects came into his field of perception, uneven shapes and flat planes and sharp objects he’d knocked of the table in the quest for his useless, glassy, eyes.  
  
“Love shouldn’t be like this,” Kubo managed to say, because he didn’t have the nerve to lash out at his aunts, not yet.  
  
Yukami, uncharacteristically quiet up until now, tsked disapprovingly. “Grandfather is going to be so disappointed.”  
  
Those seven words gave Kubo all the strength he needed to hurl a hand mirror at her head. Fear was a stronger motivator even than heartbreak. Kubo just had to hope it was stronger than the thing his family called love.  
  
There were twin screams from his aunts as he scrambled back, accompanied by the disappointing sound of glass shattering on the wood floor, meaning he’d probably missed.  
  
“Kubo,” one of then breathed, furious and ugly. The sound alone had Kubo reaching for his shamisen, but before he did he made sure to shove the balled up mess of his father’s robe down his shirt, where the tear stained beetle embroidery could be close to his skin.  
  
Somehow, that seemed to invoke even more of his aunts’ ire.  
  
“Those rags?” Yukami said in a dangerous voice, “All this for that?”

The implication that it wasn’t worth it, that his past, his family, his father, couldn’t possibly be worth it, was enraging. “His name was Hanzo!” Kubo snapped, “He was my _father_ and you took him away, you take everything away!”

His fingers hesitated over the strings, reluctant to use any magic against his own kinsmen, even in the middle of what was rapidly becoming a fight. Kubo didn’t think he’d ever had a family fight before.

No, perhaps he had. Now there were dim, memories of a dark forest and running in step with a tiny, tripping girl from monsters in the darkness, and a pain so big it threatened to blot out his mind, his empty eye socket roaring with fire. They were barely there, like a faded story, worn out with retelling until only the bones remained, and he wasn’t entirely sure he wanted to remember something that hurt so much, but he clung to them all the same.

Through the blind haze of recall came Yukami’s fury, a tidal wave of anger, undirected but obliterating all in its path. “He was a thief, a petty human thief who stole a star’s heart and thought it could possibly be his.”

“She _left_ us,” Karasu snarled in agreement, “And now you would upset our family as well. Nephew, I thought we were getting along,” Beneath the mockery that came as second nature to her, she seemed truly hurt at Kubo’s betrayal. He knew this would make her all the more dangerous.

Still, they were his aunts. They had held him when he recovered, had followed him around and minded him when no one else would. On Grandfather’s orders, sure, but they’d been… not nice, but they’d tried to be family, in their own way.

He put in one last plea, “Please, I just need to know the truth.”

“The truth?” Karasu softened, the air around her stilled, “The truth is that we love you, Kubo. We love you so much.”

Then she went for his throat.

It almost worked, but weeks and weeks of practice had taught Kubo how to- if not block his aunts’ attacks- at least anticipate them. The shamisen responded quickly, even to his panic, and after a few desperate notes the he could hear paper rustling, could feel the inanimate origami figures around him, under his feet, coming to life.

They must have attacked his aunts, that was the only explanation for the noises he heard afterwards, like someone had just thrown a bucket of ants on a cat. Not overly inconvenienced, but definitely offended and _mad_.

Instinctively, he backed up. Then he remembered there was only one door. Unless he planned to break down the walls, the only way out was forward.

Yukami must have seen him planning.

“ _Kubo_ ,” she said gently, more of a warning than anything else. It was enough to let him triangulate her position, she was by the door, waiting for him.

He could wait her out… on the other hand, origami could only distract Karasu for so long and playing while trying to think critically was a losing game. Music was a matter of instincts, and as long as your hands were on the strings you had to follow your instincts as well.

Strumming fast, Kubo barrelled forward headfirst, in the desperate hope that he might catch her off guard. Three long strides in, he feinted left, nearly slammed into the door frame, and felt Yukami’s claws catch at the back of his coat.

Even more fear, the bubbling resentment rapidly turning into hatred, and a panic like boiling water, all rose to fill his chest, squeezing his heart and lungs. It didn’t matter that he had no where to go, no one to run to, it didn’t matter that he was only putting off the inevitable. He couldn’t let her catch him!

 _She was going to take his eye_!

Pain, real and remembered, lanced through Kubo’s head as he writhed, accidentally throwing himself into the wall in an attempt to get away from his aunt, to no avail. Her one handed grip on him was still enough to drag him back, and then she had both hands in in the silk of the back of his shirt, almost lifting him off the floor by his collar.

Kubo curled in on himself, protecting his father’s robe still balled against him chest and his shamisen. The instrument quivered with tension, it didn’t like being manhandled at the best of times and now it felt like it was about to snap at the neck.

 _It wants to be played_ , Kubo thought, in between mental screaming. So, he unfurled himself just enough that he wasn’t leaning on the strings, and threw himself behind a desperate, three stringed assault.

Heat folded over his hands and washed over the drum, the first clue that he’d either done something very wrong, or very right. It was blistering, encompassing, yet somehow distant and bright. With it came force, pulling his hair up and his feet down, grounding him and pushing everything else away. He remembered lightning from his time on the earth, but only as something that happened in the sky. Now it was happening on him.

The noise was all sawari, as if he’d accidentally pulled all the strings too low instead of just one. The low drone of it was comforting, like the sound of crickets in the summer, but all at once, all the time, right now and forever. It built under his hands, then doubled when he let go of the strings and let the sound into the air.

Aunt Yukami let go of him very fast.

For a second Kubo stood there, feeling the heat and the frizzing energy around him and inside him and dancing over the shamisen string, afraid to move lest the magic break. When the buzz finally started to die away, he came to his senses and bolted for it.

He wasn’t sure if there was a doorway anymore, or if he had aunts anymore (he really hoped he did) but just in case he made for where the door had been and was relieved when he had to shove it open. Not too much damage then.

“Nephew, you are making us vexed-” Karasu hissed

Kubo ran, away from the destruction he’d wrought, his aunts close on his tail. Down the hallway, out through the antechamber, slamming open sliding partitions in his way. His shamisen, empty of music and magic now that it had done its part, hit his chest as he sprinted.

He heard Grandfather’s mild tones, distant but coming closer, and knew he needed to get out, _now_.

Open air, that was the key. If he got under the floor he knew they couldn’t follow him there.

The flow of fresh air led out, through interminable doors and little ways that made Kubo slow down and feel his way around this place he should have known. He could hear his aunts behind him, loud in their rage and spreading it around. Soon Grandfather would know and Grandfather would be mad, and then he’d be in trouble. He wasn’t entirely sure what that meant for him in the short term, but it probably wasn’t good.

Therefore there was only one sensible choice. He had to hide until the threat diminished, or at least until he had come to term with the consequences. He needed time to process, to try to tease out his slowly returning memories. He couldn’t think of any way to make running away a long term solution, but it had to work for the time being.

His aunts were gaining on him. It was like trying to outrun a typhoon. There was no real chance in fighting, only the promise of high ground, and in the labyrinth that was the Palace of the Moon, safety seemed an awfully long way away. Wind and smoke started to whip at Kubo’s hair and nip at his ankles and he tried to lengthen his stride, letting go of his shamisen entirely so he could throw his arms out in front of him as buffers.

Hot fingers of smoke were grabbing at him, trying to find purchase, and though Kubo shook them off, they threw off his gait and balance. Doors and shutters rattled in Karasu and Yukami’s wake, bringing warning too late. He hit fresh, outside air and felt his palms slam into the handrail of the outer walkway, even as one of them caught him by the shamisen slung across his back.

Kubo didn’t hesitate as he dropped and ducked, pulling down and forward until he’d shimmied out of the shoulder strap and anything else his aunts might have caught. Then he rolled off the raised wood walk and hit the ground a few feet below in a billow of fine moon dust. He covered his mouth and coughed with one hand as he crawled, headed for the relative safety of the underneath, of the corners where only children could wedge themselves.

There was a frustrated cry from above him, edging closer to a wail than Kubo was used to from his aunties, and as he pulled himself forward on his elbows he smiled. The beetle robe still shoved down the front of his shirt was uncomfortable to lie on, and he could already feel himself choking on the ever present dust, but he’d _won_. Sort of. Arguably.

His aunts were being suspiciously silent. He’d expected at least a few threats, but instead all he heard from above him were whispers.

Grandfather’s sleeted anger, smooth and sharp as a moonbeam, boomed out instead.

“Kubo. I am not sure what you have done this time, and I am quite certain I do not need to know. My patience for you grows thin, grandson. There is only so much even the most loving patriarch can take. I could tear up this floor and find you right now, but I will not make such a mess for such a petty matter. You will come out eventually, and when you do we will have much to discuss. Perhaps you don’t realize what I really saved you from. Perhaps you ought to.”

Kubo froze, and it seemed like everything else did too. Even the dust motes in the air were still for a moment and the sudden statue silence of his aunts above him seemed as terrified as it was respectful.

“Your mother,” Grandfather opined solemnly, “Was the rot in this family. Perhaps I have been too forgiving. Where there is decay, you must attack it vigorously, no? I am sure you would know all about decay, wouldn’t you, Kubo? You who so desperately wants to be human, so much so that you would tear your own family apart for it. You must know the nature of dying.”

He stayed where he was, still and silent, until it became clear Grandfather didn’t have anything else to say. Then he pulled the beetle robes out, used it to wipe the dirt off his face, and crawled forward. Suddenly, more desperately than ever, he needed to get away.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  


“You have to help me,” Kubo said hurriedly, before the Lady could even begin to question his appearance in its sudden, startling, messy impropriety. “Please.”

“What happened?” she asked, shaken. “Littl- Kubo. Kubo, what happened? You look like a ghost.”

He probably did.

Since getting help was vital, and there was really only one person he even began to trust, Kubo had made a dangerous decision and slid out from under the floors as soon as possible. You could only get so far on knees and forearms. It was far faster, he thought, to run.

The grey dust fell off him in clouds as he sprinted through the quiet pavilions and far reaching pathways. It was a blessing that the Lady made her place so far away from everyone else. It made it less likely that he would get caught. He was out of breath and shivering when he reached her. The dust that hadn’t fled with the wind was still caught in the weave of his clothes or plastered to his damp skin.

“It didn’t work,” Kubo said grimly. “It didn’t work, I couldn’t make my eyes fit and then I got discovered…”

“Tell me what happened,” Lady Kaguya ordered, in a tone that offered no other options. Kubo gratefully collapsed into her textile filled orbit and let the story unspool from the pit of his stomach, clawing its way up his throat and out into the world.

“I broke into Grandfather’s study, and I found a room with secret things, and I found my eyes. At least I think they were my eyes, they were round and they seemed like they should be mine. But when I tried to put them back they didn’t work, it was like they’d turned to stone and weren’t real flesh anymore. It just hurt. They were there, like you promised- but they weren’t mine anymore.” The thought of his calcified eyes, heavy and smooth and perfectly round as stones, made Kubo want to gag.  
  
Kaguya flinched with a rustle of fabric. “I’m sorry, Kubo. I didn’t expect that. I hoped it would go better.”

“It’s not your fault,” he told her, even though it wasn’t entirely true. “I should have left then but I didn’t. I was so upset, I didn’t want to leave. After a while my aunts found me, they weren’t happy. I… um… ran away from them. And Grandfather. They’re going to kill me.” Put in words it sounded less world-ending, but that didn’t make it any less terrifying. The Moon was not eternal like Grandfather said. It was breakable as an egg, and Kubo worried he might have shattered the peace.

“No, they probably won’t,” Lady Kaguya mused, in a voice on the verge of breaking. “However you are right Kubo, this is less than ideal. Are you- are you alright? Were you hurt?”

Kubo sucked in a deep breath, and realized no one had asked after his well being in a while. It was… nice. It almost detracted from the screaming dread.

“I’m afraid,” he admitted quietly.

Almost to herself, she muttered, “You are sweating, your heart races. Is that fear? I suppose it must be.”

“And, ah, anything else?”

“No. I just, I wish it had worked,” Kubo said, pulling his knees up to his chest. His father’s robe, folded like a breastplate, pressed against his stomach and protected his chest. It wasn’t strong steel or even wood, but it made him breath a little easier just having it there.

“As do I. Now, what are you planning on doing? Your family isn’t happy with you, you said.” It was striking how quickly she got back to business. As nice as she was, she was still a creature of the stars and emotion did not come easily to her. At best, she seemed to be able to manage large amounts of melancholy, tinged with sympathy, and even that was overwhelmed by pragmatism.

Kubo started. “I don’t know! There’s nowhere I can go, they’ll find me eventually. There’s nothing I can do except say I’m sorry and I’m _not_.”

“Your grandfather is not forgiving,” Kaguya mused, “But he does not like conflict either. It is messy, and he abhors it. Once he gets over his temper, he will understand the benefit of getting this all over with quickly.”

“I never want to see him again!” Kubo snapped, “He’s old and mean, and he never loved me, not really. Maybe my aunts did a little, but never him. He loves the idea of a perfect family, but he seems to hate actually having one.”

“Surely he wasn’t always unkind to you,” Lady Kaguya said nervously, as if to give a perfunctory nod to her feudal loyalties.

“It doesn’t matter,” Kubo said firmly, “One nice thing doesn’t fix a whole mountain of bad. You can’t replace someone’s missing heart with a few drops of blood and expect it to give them a pulse like a real person. He had my mother killed and he stole my eyes and I can’t forgive him.”

“You are a very principled young man,” she observed with a smile.

Kubo swallowed, “I think- I think I was raised right.” He could feel the truth in it, as real and tangible as the thread beetles scratching his skin. “Or I was raised human, at least. But I don’t know what to do now, and I’m scared and I don’t have much time.” It was all quiet here, in the Lady’s sanctuary so close to the Earth’s smiling face. Even her koto was quiet. All too easily he could imagine his aunts’ pouncing from behind a pillar. It was only a matter of time before they caught up, and he didn’t have his shamisen now. All he had was a sword and he didn’t know how to use magic with that.

“Kubo,” she said, so apologetic he started panicking again, “I don’t know how to help you either. I have so little. I cannot hide you from your grandfather’s magic, or your aunts, they are relentless. I can barely help myself, and you are so much braver than I am. This place takes everyone’s hearts, and their eyes, and their courage, until we can do nothing but move about the heavens and linger amid the years. And yet you still have yours. You see what is truly there, you know the truth, you _remember_.”

“I don’t!” he protested, and she put a hand on his shoulder.

“Your heart does. The rest of it, the words, they don’t matter as much. Your muscles know the melody, and you have faith in it, in yourself. I haven’t been able to find that knowledge after centuries of searching, but you still have it. That is a blessing, and you must not take it for granted. Now, brave hero, what do are you going to do?”

Kubo scrubbed at his cheeks with the palms of his hands. “I- I need to go to earth. I need to leave here, it’s drowning me. Can you send me there? Please?”

Her hesitation was incredibly disheartening.

“Once, perhaps,” Kaguya said, “But that way was closed to me long ago, and closed again when your mother ran away over a decade ago.”

He wanted to scream. Instead he flopped back, his head landing on the wood floor with a thunk, his body still cushioned by her layered robes. “I guess I’ll just die then.”

It wasn’t a joke, but Lady Kaguya tittered nervously anyways. Then she reached over and tugged at the neckline of his shirt, where his father’s beetle robe just peeked out. With two fingers she pinched it and pulled.

“What is this?”

Kubo grabbed it back, instinctively wanting to keep it close. “It was my father’s, I think. I remember my mother giving it to me. I was wearing it when they took me away, and it was with my eyes.” Because she was his friend he relaxed somewhat and let her inspect it. “It has his family crest? That or he was really into beetles.”

“It’s enchanted,” she told him absently as she shook it out and held it up.

“What? Why?”

“That is what I’m trying to figure out,” she said, tersely, and for a few still moments, horrible silence descended, interrupted only by occasional thoughtful sighs or the sound of her turning it over in her hands. Kubo was already imagining what magic could have been placed on it by his Grandfather, some horrible curse, probably, when Lady Kaguya placed one hand on his shoulder.

“Breath out,” she instructed. “And listen closely. We don’t have much time. The spell on this is almost as old as you are, your mother must have set it. It can get you away from here and to safety. I do not know where. Kubo. You can leave this place, all you have to do is put on the robe. It is- it is a risky choice. I am not sure if it is one I would make. But you are human, and it is yours. Just make it before your family comes. You do not want them to follow your flight.”

It took him a few seconds to put all the pieces together, into one glorious picture of escape.

“Really?”

She made a pained sound deep in her throat, but agreed. “Truly, little prince.”

“I have to go then,” he said, and felt absurdly like he was explaining himself. She had tried so hard to help him, it felt ungrateful to leave now. “I’m sorry, but I have to go.”

The smile behind her words was strained, but still there. “Yes, I know you do.”

While Kubo struggled out of his heavy moon robes and belted the threadbare earth one around him, she played a few, broken notes, then gave up. “It’s so beautiful,” she said, “It can even convince the blind. Kubo, sweet prince, could you promise me something?”

He knelt next to her. “Of course, anything.”

She pulled him close, her hands already hot with magic, and whispered in his ear, “Enjoy every second of it, won’t you?”

Then a buzzing filled his ears and he felt himself lifting up and up. For a second her arms were the only thing tethering him to solid ground, and then she let him go.

It didn’t feel like flying so much as falling, inertia wise. It was _exhilarating_.

Kubo heard her words over and over again as he fell off the moon.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  


For what felt like forever he tumbled through the void. The zipping wings on his back, which he could just barely feel catching at his hair, seemed mostly unconcerned with direction or stability. He was headed nowhere in particular except away.

He wondered where he’d end up.

 _Home_ , Kubo thought, filling the word with all the intent of an invocation. _I’d like to go home please._

He had no idea where home was anymore, his brain threw up conflicting images of a cave by the sea and fields of wheat and his tangled pile of silks back on the moon. Home was a blank space where a village should have been, and his mother’s smile that made the scar above her eye crease, and neither of those were safe or real anymore.

Wherever home might be, he ached for it.

Flailing about in the rush of air had stopped being fun, so Kubo curled up in a ball and let the wings take over. Maybe it was just that he was closer to the earth now, but they seemed to have more intent the further he went. They were favouring his right to an ever increasing degree, making him twist and roll in the sky.

At first, the air around him had been almost impossibly cold and thin, to the point that it was catch his breath as the chill wind rushed past him. Slowly it had started to warm up, the briskness of falling and the pressure of air being pushed away around him enough to bring heat back into Kubo’s extremities. Now his skin was almost uncomfortably hot and every inch of it was being pushed back. His cheeks were trying to escape into his ears and his lips were peeling back from his teeth.

If this was what flying felt like, he couldn’t say much for it, though in the defense of birds, most of them probably didn’t start out by leaping off of the moon.

A slight slowing was the only warning Kubo got that the ground was incoming. He didn’t land, he impacted gently, dropping out of the sky and into the paving below in increments. When his hands touched the worn stones, the wings gave up entirely, and let him fall the last few inches alone.

Kubo sat up, and found the world was silent aside from the breeze. Not even animal sounds broke the quiet, which hadn’t been too exceptional on the moon, but which he remembered was more noteworthy on the earth below.

He stretched his legs, checked for bruises, then- deciding that the bruise situation was manageable- got to his feet.

Promptly after standing, he tripped over something on the ground. It turned out to be a dusty, rusty set of metal armour, sitting out in the elements. Kubo identified the bowl of a helmet and a few shuttered plates of mail before deciding to leave it alone. He didn’t like the idea of finding bones amid the rusting iron.

The next thing he found- after stepping carefully over several more piles of abandoned armour- was a tree.

Cool smooth skin, segmenting at regular intervals, stiff and unresponsively wooden but still obviously alive. Little flaws marred the surface of the bamboo stalk. Kubo wanted to kiss every one. He felt his way over to the next tree, rougher and more crooked, and found leaves. Real leaves! They came off easily, crushed easily, and gave off the bitter scent of plants dying. They were impermanent, and cheap, and therefore priceless.

When Kubo finally found a wall, he leaned against it and smiled giddily into the air.

Then he remembered his mother’s warnings.

He was out in the open, wasn’t he? He couldn’t tell if it was night or day, but he couldn’t feel the sun. It wasn’t safe to be out at night, Grandfather would find him. Grandfather _had_ found him and could again. He wasn’t sure where he was, but it wasn’t safe to be out and about until he knew for certain.

Kubo hastily followed the wall, tripping over rusting piles of armour and weapons as he did. It led him forward, into a corner, then left and up some stairs. Stairs were good. Stairs rarely led outside.

Everything about this place was as ruined as it was grand, he realized. The style was taller and more complex than the deceptive simplicity of the Moon Kingdom. Arches here seemed to reach higher, walls were more solid. The Moon had been a world of gilt and paper, this palace was made of stone.

Yet everywhere Kubo fell over things out of place, pieces that had fallen from the walls and ceiling, fallen decorations, smashed pots, empty armour that clanged when his foot slammed into it.

“Hello?” he shouted. It was better, probably, to be forward than to surprise someone, or worse, be surprised. “Hello, is anyone there?”

Nothing but the whistle of the wind seeping through from outside answered him.

“Well, I’m here,” Kubo said, for the benefit of any listeners. “And I think I have to stay the night, until the sun comes back out at least.”

With that, he started looking for a room.  
  
It was all too easy to find one. He had a solid sense for how castles worked now, and he knew the fancy spaces tended to gravitate towards the center and the front. The bedroom he found himself in was big, made for the lord of the manor himself. The soft mat floor was a relief after stone and unknown tripping hazards. Kubo had gotten rid of his burdensome moon robes with glee (the feather cape had been especially nice to take off once and for all), but had kept his puffy pants and his too long sword, and most importantly his inside socks. Footwise, he wasn’t equipped for surprises.

There was a futon still laid out in the room, like no one had ever bothered to fold it up. Dust was thicker on it than the covers themselves.  
  
Next to the bed Kubo found a padded box, the sort women used to hold babies in while they worked. It was more ornate than what he felt cribs should be, but it was clearly a crib all the same. There were even a few toys inside, simple wooden dolls with teething marks in them, a quilted infants jacket with rings that jingled.

Carefully, Kubo lined the dolls up by the side of the bed, and said a little prayer to whoever had lived here, long ago. When he found a spinning wooden koma top, he played with it for a few minutes before adding it to the shrine too.

“Sorry,” he whispered, “about whatever happened here. I just need a place to hide out for a bit. I hope you found peace.”

Then he shook out the bedding, curled up, and went to sleep. It came all too easily, he was on edge but he was also tired, and frankly he thought ghosts probably couldn’t touch him while he slept, so it was better to be out anyways.

As he drifted off, he thought he heard a koto playing somewhere far off, a world away but so close he could reach it. It was a sad song, and it suited the place. Trust the Lady to have good taste, even in dreams.

  
  
  
  


 

 

“ _How are you, full Moon-_ ” Beetle sings in his surprisingly soft tenor.

Sariatu nixes that one right out of the gate. “Something else, please?” The last few hours have been an adventure of discovery, namely discovering how many songs have the word moon in them. Quite a few, it turns out. Humans are transfixed.

He nods agreeably, and his face screws up as he thinks. “Okay, how about this one. Start playing if you know it. _Oh! Soran, soraaan…_ ”

She takes up the beat, smacking her shamisen to copy the drums they don’t have, but dissolves into giggles after a few bars. Beetle is too enthusiastic. It’s how you’re supposed to sing sea shanties, yes, but the whole thing falls apart miles from the ocean.

“How do you even know that one?”

He shrugs, “I’m very well rounded,” he claims, and she remembers that Hanzo, unlike his soldiers, would have had chances to travel in his youth. Recategorizing Beetle, from a mere common warrior to a noble born man- even one with no memory- explains a lot.

Sariatu laughs again, a little breathlessly, and Monkey starts looking concerned for her. She tries to modulate it, tries to be a leader and mother and not a girl in love once more. It’s early morning, before the sun has really started to take its toll on her, and she’s giddy with it.

“Perhaps something a quieter?” she suggests. “An nice ondo?”

A lullaby sounds better, she is still tired, but she’ll settle for anything with a beat you can walk to and a minimum of moon references. A bushi would be more likely to be written for shamisen, but they’ve worked through most of the songs she can remember well enough to play, which means what’s left over is questionable. She trusts Beetle to come up with something though.

He’d used to bring her songs once, she thinks fuzzily, and takes a step closer to Monkey’s steadying bulk. Songs from far away, sometimes with music, but more often just words. He was better at syllables than notes.

Beetle walks in silence for a while. She nearly suspects he’s given up on music altogether, or gotten distracted, or forgotten, when he starts humming.

“ _The sun sets behind the mountain, covered with autumn leaves…._ ”

He sings. She listens. She doesn’t know the melody to this one. It’s lovely still, if a little stilted, as if half remembered.

Around them, the sun is rising behind the mountains covered with autumn leaves. It is beautiful. The last reds and yellows of autumn have stayed here in the foothills, contrasting sharply with the stalwart evergreen pines. Scarlet maple and golden ginkgoes war right up to the lakefront in the distance.

The second piece of the armour had been so close to the first, it had been sensible to look around nearby for the third instead of turning right around to seek guidance again. If Sariatu pretended that was her reasoning, she didn’t have to acknowledge that she didn’t want to interrupt the bubble still perfection of having her husband back, though he was so changed she had not recognized him at first. He was hers, and he was here, and though it hurt it was a good pain, like pressing on a bruise.

“It’s beautiful,” Sariatu says, when she realizes Beetle has stopped singing. He’s stopped walking as well, though probably because she did first. The dew touched, shining leaves above them glitter as the sun rises still higher.

“A beautiful song for a beautiful season,” he says cheerfully. “The leaves closer to the ice plains have probably already fallen, but it’s nice down here. Still a week or two before the cold snaps. You know autumn is the season for lovers?”

Monkey squawks, but there seems to be nothing but the general, genial, low level flirtation in Beetle’s face. It was entirely possible it isn’t intentional. Perhaps he’s just that sensual of a person.

“I don’t know why,” Sariatu says, not for the first time, and certainly not for the first time to Hanzo. “Everything is dying.”

“And that’s why it’s romantic. Anyone can be in love in spring, things are easy in spring. Sure, the cherry blossoms fall, but after that you get cherries. Autumn brings life home, autumn makes you realize how quickly it’s all over. Autumn is when everyone is most alive, because it’s when the threats are closest to your door.” Beetle smiled, chipped tooth and all. “You’ve been in fights before. Isn’t it much better when there’s something to fight for?”

She considers this, then tries again from a human perspective. Harvest season is frenetic, desperate, and full of festivals for it. There is a lot to celebrate, when there’s a lot on the line.

“Maybe,” she allows, feeling thrown off guard. She can do poetry about autumn leaves and she can do it for hours. Thunder, the milky way, insects, every single shade of red and orange. There is a formula there. Hanzo’s brand of bizarre philosophy has always thrown her off guard. It doesn’t follow any rules except that of sentiment.

For a while they all consider the scenery. Monkey climbs a tree, perhaps to scout or maybe to get a better look at the patchwork of rich autumnal shades marching down and up the hills. She has a pretty good sense of aesthetics for a primate. Sariatu tilts her head up and lets the pale morning sunlight filter through the red leaves just overhead. Even the sun can be beautiful in the right setting. Muted by foliage, it is less unforgiving.

“We should keep going,” Beetle says eventually, “We have a lot of ground to cover,”

“This is _my_ quest,” Sariatu reminds him, just to be difficult.

He doesn’t hesitate. “And _you_ are mine.”

They walk together through the foothills, looking for anything especially mythical in nature.

“Would you mind singing that last song again?” She’d almost been able to come up with the right tune to play it, but the tempo eluded her.

Hanzo smiles.

“ _The floating leaves are swaying…_ ”

  
  


 

They are thirty or so renditions in when Sariatu finally perfects her accompaniment and gives into the disapproving gaze of the sun. Even in a weakened, mortal state, she is not meant to be out at this time of day, or any time of day at all.

Underneath a giant pine, in a space that felt almost like a room made of branches, they make a camp. She rests, while Beetle and Monkey arm wrestle. Slowly but graciously, the sun goes down, and in the evening they scour the nearby landscape for signs of the Helmet.

It’s difficult, functioning only in the twilight hours between true day and true night, but that is the price that must be paid for divinity, however mean a portion of her being it is now. She has never resented her origins more than now.

“We should go back,” she admits, as the dark red of the horizon starts to tip into purple.

Beetle looks around, at the trees covering them, and the darkening sky. “We could keep going,” he suggests. “I mean, it’s pretty shady here, and we were on the beach all night by the lake, and no one found us.”

He has a point. The lake incident had been… poorly thought out, Sariatu knows, but it demonstrated that her father wasn’t paying attention, or worse, was biding his time. Under the moonlight that night, the Breastplate gleaming, they still hadn’t been caught. A shadowed wood at night is safe as houses by comparison.

She really wants to keep going. The darker it gets, the more clarity of mind she regains. Sariatu and her sisters were born of a sword, and sometimes she still feels like one. In day she is dull, but the night sharpens her until she gleams and that power is wonderful. It has been too long since she has let herself shine.

Kubo has been waiting too long, in that horrible place of frozen immortality, and she would take a thousand risks if it meant getting him back a moment sooner.

Monkey is her better half, and she looks hesitant, but not too hesitant. Against silver fur, the darker smudge that is her face contorts in thought before she gives Sariatu a grimace of agreement.

Sariatu makes a decision. “We’ll stay under the trees, out of the open,” she says, trying to sound like a measured leader and not a woman desperate to have her child back in her arms. “Out of the bamboo as well, there isn’t enough foliage in those close thickets of it.”

They keep picking their way down little screes and between tall strong pines. Sariatu checks the older trees for hollows that might lead to secret caves, while Beetle taps on every rock. Most of all, she keeps her now clear senses open for any whiff of magic. The Armour of heroes is subtle, but it will have guardians, and surely they will not be. After all, no one would just leave an incredibly powerful magical artifact lying around. It wouldn’t be… heroic. Every quest needs a proper end, and after the Garden of Eyes Sariatu half expects to end up battling a storm dragon or an ogre the size of a mountain for the last piece of the armour.

Beetle seems to have similar notions, because his sword is drawn. He’s using it to cut down overripe matatabi fruit from a vine, but it still has the rusty gleam of a weapon and the way he jumps makes Sariatu think he intends to use it if needed.

They are all on edge, even as they share the fruit and joke. Only the slightest change in the breeze is needed to make all three of them spin, looking for a threat.

She is not hard to find.  
  
Yukami, and Sariatu knows it is her because no one but Yukami would hold a pipe like she intended to break it, is standing under a tree a few feet away. Alone, she somehow looks slighter, less menacing without her twin at her side, mirroring her eerily.

At night, Sariatu has the presence of mind to think before she acts. She does not draw her sword, simply the fact that she has it gives too much away. She goes for her shamisen instead. A blade is useful, yes, but music well applied has more power still.

Years ago, she had stopped tsunamis with a note, brought life into being with a song, but she’d been younger then. Yukami is visibly seething, and it will take more to stop her than it would a to halt a tidal wave.

Beetle and Monkey are poised to charge, but Sariatu throws out an arm to hold them back. A flaw of the heavens is a lethal tendency to monologue, and she fully intends to let her sister start talking first.

Predictable as ever, Yukami does.

“You are foolish,” she spits, “I can see where your son gets it from. It only took me a few hours to find you. Where is he?”

The illusion of control Sariatu had almost convinced herself was true shatters. “Where is he?” she says, baffled, “You should have him! You _kidnapped_ him.”

Yukami hesitates ever so briefly, and glances up at the sky. Moonlight still leaks through the leaves above them, the forest is not quite thick enough here. Is Father watching? Surely he must be, he is not an insensible god.

She has a limited amount of magic left in this state. It is hard to tell how much, exactly. More than she had possessed in those long, withering years as Kubo grew and she faded, but not enough, not nearly enough. Still, Yukami doesn’t have to know that.

Sariatu plucks the first few notes of the song about autumn leaves, the one she and Beetle had perfected all morning. The leaves obediently shift, closing ranks like soldiers. Boughs creak above them as trees strain under their new marching orders, but slowly the light disappears, until only a few bars of it lance through the cover to reach the forest floor.

In the new, heavier shadows, Yukami is almost invisible. Only her pale mask stands out, and even that is made blue-grey by the night.

“Talk,” Sariatu orders, “Now.”

“You’re not in charge of me!” Yukami snaps back. She has never been a model of maturity unless compared to their even younger sister. Now, alone, she has no worse example to stand out against. “You and your- companions,” her sneer is audible, if not visible, “have nothing to do with this. Family matters are, after all, for family. However, since the stain of your treason never seems to escape us, now I to find your brat, again. Do you have him, or not?”

Reading masks was always a skill in the court of the Moon, and Sariatu knows her sister well. She can tell she’s staring at Beetle, barely even addressing Sariatu.

Beetle is objectively the most armed person in the clearing, two swords drawn and his two other hands stealthily readying his bow. Yukami is not counting by those numbers though. Yukami, who so rarely preoccupies herself with anything mortal, or even anything outside their family, wouldn’t spare more than an instant for a large, four-armed Beetle man unless she knew something.

Her sisters always have been grudge holders of the worst sort. It’s not their fault, patience comes too easily to immortals and so does cruelty. Sariatu had been like them once herself.

Now, she just knows how their minds work.

“You _lost_ my _son_?” she says in a tone of flat disbelief, trying to distract Yukami’s attention and process the news all at once. Joy and fear mingle together, and worse, she has to be worried about other people as well. Beetle, herself, there are too many factors and already she can feel a headache rising from just behind her eye.

“He ran away,” Yukami retorts, because Yukami can never shut up when it’s good for her. “It runs in the family, it seems. Where is he?”

“I don’t know,” Sariatu says, thrown off by her bluntness, “Why would I know, you had him last!”

They’re talking in surreal circles now, and the frustration is palpable. The idea of Kubo being free is somehow matched by Sariatu’s terror that he is now someplace unknown, without help. At least when he was on the Moon, she’d had a lock on him. Now, he could be anywhere.

He’s just a little boy. Brave, yes, and more powerful than she’d thinks anyone fully understands yet, but young and inexperienced. The fact that he’s run away (which Sariatu takes no small amount of pride in) does not erase his age, or the fact that he shouldn’t be left alone without anyone to help take care of him.

Even back at the Sun Village, there had been people who loved him. On the Moon, surely he had been loved, however twisted love was there.

Beetle interrupts. He looks more and more awkward the longer the face off goes. “Sorry, but this is your, um-”

“Sister,” Sariatu confirms, and finds the word even more bitter to the tongue than to the mind. “We’re sisters.”

“We were,” Yukami mutters, eyes still fixed on Beetle. “I see memory fails insects even more than men.”

She knows, but she doesn’t know Sariatu knows.

“He remembers enough. We both remember what’s important.”

Yukami tilts her head, regarding both of them. Then she laughs.

“I left you here to hurt you, sister. I wanted you to suffer, and you went and brought suffering on yourself.”

Sariatu recalls the tang of the elixir of immortality, Yukami’s attempt at vengeance. She does prefer long, slow punishments to simple deaths. She always has. Beetle’s curse has her fingerprints all over it.

Bizarrely, Sariatu is grateful. In her anger, her sister has given her the greatest of gifts. Time, the power to fight back, and her husband by her side.

Saying so will undoubtedly drive Yukami into an absolute tantrum, and for a moment Sariatu considers it. But someone has to be the adult here, and it might as well be her.

She sighs, and turns away. “I don’t know where Kubo is. You know I’ll have to look for him?”

“If you must,” Yukami replies, tone flat. “Maybe this time I’ll kill you.”

“I don’t think you could. Not like this.” She had hesitated once. Her mercy was entirely spitefully driven, but it was mercy all the same. Sariatu doesn’t blame her. Unless Kubo himself were on the line, she isn’t sure if she could harm her sisters either.

With a scrape of steel, Yukami draws her sword. “You know _nothing_.” It’s a worrying sound, even with two people covering her turned back. Sariatu glances back just in time to see the almost imperceptible tilt of a mask, as Yukami looks back up at the leaves standing between them and the judgemental moon.

It is one of things Sariatu wouldn’t have been able to notice in the day, much less process, but now she is almost alive and a hunch creeps over her.  
  
“Does Father know I’m not dead?”

If Kubo truly is missing, his wrath must be immense. He would not send Yukami to stand against her sister alone, not now that Sariatu has two thirds of the armour. An army is more his style, a monster, a wave to wipe out an entire island. Sariatu knows where she gets her rage.

Yukami’s silence is answer enough.

“Wonderful. You know, Yu, that’s practically independent thinking. I’d watch that if I were you. One traitor daughter is enough for him already.”

“Some of us learn from our elders’ mistakes. Sister?”

The wind through the trees is picking up, and Sariatu has to raise her voice to reply. “Yes?”

“He will kill you, without a doubt. His childrens’ weakness is not his. You can’t rely on him to be…”

“Nice?” Sariatu smiles faintly. “I know.”

“I would have said, pathetically human.” Yukami has an edge to her voice that is not quite anger. Maybe, just maybe, it’s sadness.

Then again, it is hard to tell. Emotion does not come easily to creatures of the stars. They are not meant to have hearts, only edges. Still, if mercy is human, what does that make Yukami? Immortality was a cold and brutal beverage, but it was the only thing she knew to make people better, and she had given it to Sariatu with more the malice of a torturer and motives that couldn’t be unpacked without a crowbar.

This still, shocked anger is probably the calmest she’s going to get her sister, so Sariatu tries one more question.

“And my son, the pathetically human one? How was he? Was he happy with you?” _Was he safe?_

Yukami hesitates. “I- he would have been. If you hadn’t ruined everything. He would have… adjusted.”

It is not the answer any mother wants to hear, but Sariatu resigned herself to this tragedy long ago. “You know I’m going to look for him.”

It’s not a question.

“You shouldn’t,” her sister tells her. “Stay here. Keep your insect, and your primate, and whatever other lost souls you have found. Live in the day. Fade away, slowly and in pieces. Otherwise I _will_ kill you.”

“I will fade anyways. I can do it with my son,” Sariatu says, and gets ready to block. A sixth sense for when patience is wearing thin is perhaps the only reliable read she can get on her sister, but it’s a valuable one.

Predictably, Yukami snarls and charges.

Before Beetle, or even the already leaping Monkey can intercept her, Sariatu catches her, hands already glowing with magic, and pushes her back. It’s too much, too fast, and even summoning it makes her lightheaded, but it’s enough to throw Yukami into a tree. She rights herself quickly, leaps off the branch and into the air, and dives forward again. This is boundary testing, not a fight.

It’s vital that Sariatu convinces her it isn’t worth it, before she passes out and undermines her own strategy. (Leaving Beetle alone with Yukami is a horrible notion. She wouldn’t put it past her to turn him into an actual to-scale beetle this time.)

One hand raised high above her head, she concentrates, or tries to, on the raw power she had when she was young. Power she still has- she knows. The proof is in Monkey, in little Hanzo crumpled and a little quieter but still animate and currently hidden in Beetle’s quiver.

The wave of light and force that emanates from her shamisen sends her staggering back as well, but it successfully knocks Yukami well into, as Hanzo would say, next week.

They recover almost simultaneously and Yukami, floating like a wraith in the air, seems to calculate.

“I’m sorry I left you alive,” she says, because she can’t shut up ever.

Sariatu grabs on of Beetle’s arms for stability, her legs have turned to jello beneath her. She looks up at her sister. Probably, she should shut her mouth. Instead she says, “I’m not.”

Yukami flies off. It is a retreat, not a sulk, but just barely.

Once she’s absolutely sure little sisters are out of the vicinity, Sariatu collapses in stages. The ground below is a drift of yellow leaves that looks too inviting. Beetle, always the fun ruiner, grabs her before she can hit them.

“So,” he says (said, is saying) “That’s your sister?”

Sariatu makes some acknowledgement of his words, which is the most she can do at the moment.

Beetle pats her soothingly on the back as the world spins. “I like your fashion sense better. Are you good?”

“Fine, I think.” For a second, she forgets who he is, and feels almost guilty when she compares him to Hanzo. The fact that he is Hanzo is a sickening revelation all over again.

“We’re going to find your kid now, right?”

Like her sister before her, Sariatu looks up at the sky and the sliver of moon there, almost invisible between the trees.

“Let’s get somewhere else before we discuss this,” she suggests, and lets herself be half carried to safety.

  
  
  
  
  


Their pine tree camp isn’t perfect shelter, but it’s enough. Beetle’s horns keep getting stuck on the lower branches, and it smells like sap and dirt, but cover is cover.

Most of the debate about where to start their new, changed search goes over her head for the first few hours. This means Beetle is mostly talking to himself.

He has a list when she wakes up from half dreams of lost children being hunted by ravens, and when dawn finally comes it’s safe enough to begin planning in full.

“The village is the first place they’d look,” Sariatu points out. “Wouldn’t it be?” They’re heartless, not stupid. They’ll follow her as well, or at least Yukami will, which means they’re back to moving by day. Sariatu had almost gotten used to the solidity of those twilight hours.

“On the other hand, does he have anywhere else to go?”

It’s a salient point. Kubo, to her knowledge, had never been more than a few miles away from the cave in his life. His experience with hiding places on earth was limited.

Already, she’s scared for him. Generalized anxiety is a nice change of pace from the well known, measurable dangers of the moon. Now she’s worried about everything.

“He could be anywhere.” It’s a sobering realization. At least the helmet was a known variable. A twelve year old boy, even a magical one, can get lost a lot more easily than an artifact of unimaginable power.

Monkey grabs her hand, startling her out of a haze of exhaustion, day sickness, and fear. She’s staring at Beetle pointedly, and slowly Sariatu’s eyes focus.

Beetle looks confused, but Monkey remains firm in her intent. A hint of red, peeking over his shoulder, finally puts the pieces in place.

“Hanzo.”

“What?” The way Beetle says it, she can almost imagine he’s responding and not asking, but he’s not the Hanzo she needs. She leans forward and holds out one cupped palm.

“Not you, little Hanzo. He can help.”

Slowly, the tiny samurai clambers up and hops into Sariatu’s hand. He is weather worn, but still keeping together. Whatever magic had brought him to life isn’t finished yet. Sariatu learned long ago not to question what miracles love could bring.

She had asked for her family, and he had given her Beetle. Surely he could find her own blood.

Sariatu brings the little warrior up to the level of her eyes and looks gravely at him. He looks back, as much as anyone can without eyes.

Softly enough that Beetle can’t hear, she says, “You brought my husband back. My son is here, or somewhere. Can you help find him?”

The paper sword raises, considers for a moment, then points south and east.

For a second, Sariatu thinks it’s the direction of the village, but no, that’s due south as the Beetle flies. Just to check, she steps outside and lines miniature Hanzo up with the excessively bright sun. No matter what way she turns him, he always points the same way.

She spins fifteen degrees to the left, to face the village, and watches as he readjusts himself to point south-east again. Next to her, Monkey shrugs and Sariatu takes an instant to be thankful one of them remembered.

Beetle, following and looking baffled, shades his eyes as he stares through the trees that way. Then he frowns.

“Not sure if it’s relevant or not,” he begins, a sure sign that it might be relevant, “But our old fortress is that way. Beetle Clan HQ. I- I find things that way sometimes. Bits and bobs. I think maybe I came from there, years ago. Not sure why I never went back, but-”

Sariatu stares at him, wide-eyed. He looks almost sheepish.

It is too early in the day for the maelstrom of scattered memories battering down the gates of her mind, so she ignores them. Creatures of the stars are not meant for complex emotions, especially before noon.

She pats Beetle’s shoulder.  
  
“Let’s go home.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annotations  
> -Kubo is out, which is good, and we're away from the Moon Kingdom. We barely knew it. Special credit goes again to Kaguya, who started out with a cameo but ended up getting a starring role in this story. Again, I'd super recommend reading the Tale of The Bamboo Cutter, it has a lot of the same roots as Kubo and the Two Strings and I'm almost certain it was an inspiration for the story. 
> 
> -This is a really musically heavy chapter, so of course there are updates to the playlist. (https://playmoss.com/en/grassyplain/playlist/knows-the-cuckoo-when-he-sings) Individually, the songs are a mix of modern traditional and few legitimately older ones I could find. Soran Bushi, for example, is a very old northern song, whereas Momiji (the one about leaves) is much newer and the only reference for it I could find was very piano based. In deference to the time period and translation, I did switch around the words a little and tweaked some of the cadence. 
> 
> \- Speaking of autumn leaves, this was sort of my last chance to get really in depth about the setting before things start speeding up. The movie has so many indicators of an early autumn setting, the Bon Festival which traditionally takes place mid-August, the foliage, Sariatu's color scheme, even the emphasis on the moon! With that in mind, this fic is set in late autumn and I did go to a lot of references for kigo (traditional seasonal words or concepts used a lot in haiku) to reference some of this. 
> 
> -Matatabi is actually drawn from a list of sansai, or wild foraged foods I found. It made sense if they were eating on the go that they'd have a lot of forest food. The vine is pretty cool, it has fruit that comes in season in September and October, but also it's a more potent alternative to catnip. 
> 
> -At one point I did spend like twenty minutes looking up ancient Japanese baby furniture and toys. The box for sticking your kid in was probably more of a lower class thing, but I suspect it would be Sariatu's style since she was so active and probably needed somewhere to put Kubo when he was little and she was up and about. (He, of course, slept with his parents, who only slept together since they were super in love and a little worried about the potential for Sariatu to disappear in the night.) Teething stuff was harder to track down good references for, but simple wooden dolls seem to have been used at some point. All the more big-kid toys were probably Hanzo's idea. He seems like the sort of person who would unironically play with a top. Everything else is wholesale conjecture.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, thanks for sticking with me! I thought this one was going to end up much longer than it did, but it turned out a tight 5000 even though _so much_ happens. Probably about two chapters left, provided I can cram everything in. Lots of love to everyone who has come this far with this story and KatTS.

 

Kubo dreamed of paper worlds and his Grandfather’s gently scolding voice.

It was a relief to wake up and feel his way to sunshine, warm and welcoming on his skin. The night had been frosty, but the early morning sheen of ice evaporated quickly, giving way to a comfortable autumnal bite. The sun had scorched the moon, heat coming quickly and evaporating just as fast, light burning the skin. On the earth it was softer, muted, kinder. Warmth stayed to soak into the bones.

He did not miss his feathered cloak, warm though it had been. He had lived for years in this threadbare robe of his father’s, and he could again.

For a while, he lay in the sun drenched courtyard, listening to the leaves on the breeze and the distant birds. Even in this ruin, life was still audible from far away.

There were no bugs, Kubo realized as he explored. Spiders had not set up shop in corners, ants had not made their homes. There weren’t any small animals either, though he remembered with shaky surety that they were always looking for dry places to make houses in. It was a mausoleum untouched.

There were plants though, and from them he found food. A persimmon tree by the very back of the little palace was not yet fully ripe, and the fruit was bitter, but he ate every fruit he could reach anyways, then climbed up the lower branches to find more. There were many, all untouched by insects or hungry animals, and he gorged himself before climbing back down. He had been eating rice dumplings, chestnuts, and sticky taro for what felt like years. The astringent taste of too young fruit was bracing, like a dip in cold water.

Water, he needed to find that. He could survive for a long time without food, but not very long without water. His family had discovered that quickly, when he’d first woken up with, throat parched, confused and still in pain.

The palace was not very big, really just a square around the central courtyard. Compared to the endless halls of his grandfather’s home, it was quaint, rural, even. It was also fairly easy to navigate. The kitchen was offset from the rest of the structure somewhat, though he wasn’t sure why, and after some bumbling he all but tripped into a low sink of stagnant water, fed by bamboo pipes that had long since collapsed. He could follow those pipes though, and he did, until he found a little stream where the wilder woods began. The water did not taste as tongue-searingly clean as the water on the moon, but he could deal with that. He dragged a heavy iron pot out of the kitchen and filled it up to carry back with him.

It was impossible to tell what time it was, but the sun was not shining as brightly on his head, and that worried Kubo. It was either very cloudy or he was in trouble, or both.

This palace place wasn’t a bad hideout. He had no idea where he was, but at the very least that meant no one would come and look for him here.

He could stay here a little while, while he figured out what to do.

On the way back inside he grabbed more persimmons, in case a midnight snack was required. Then he settled himself back in the big bedroom with the thick, soft futon and the child’s toys all lined up.

Sleeping wasn’t an attractive option now that his body wasn’t trying to give up on him, and he didn’t have his shamisen to play with. He juggled persimmons and practiced sword forms for a while, then finally gave in and started fiddling with the child’s top. Surely, the ghost of the baby who once lived here couldn’t begrudge him that. They would have been too little to play with it anyways.

His aunt found him two days later.

  
  
  
  
  


The way to her husband’s home is foreign to Sariatu. She had visited by sky when she had been young, and then had been trapped within its walls and her own protective enchantments as a wife and mother. Fortunately Beetle knows where to bring them. They follow the setting sun and paper-Hanzo’s directions.

The way is beautiful. They trek through long flat meadows and hike mountain ridges. At each turn, the path seems to stop somewhere beautiful; a forest of bamboo, a snowy hillside with a sheer drop. Every morning they wake up to new frost that slowly melts into dew. The leaves are turning to crackling brown, giving way to stark tree branches and the monochrome of wood, snow, and pale sky. Animals scurry around them, setting in their last stores for the winter or flying to better climes. Already, the birds would have begun flying past the village on their yearly trip. The raptors are a pest, the ducks and geese a helpful addition to their winter stores, the cranes and herons welcome guests.

She almost remembers a story about a heron.

Her mind is occupied by the problem of Beetle, and she can pay attention to little else. There is so much she aches to tell him, and so much she is terrified to say. Monkey keeps gently nudging them together or away, depending on her mood of the day, which doesn’t help. Making a decision is hard enough when she isn’t being buffeted by the tides of primate opinion.

Paper-Hanzo’s steady pointing hand does not waver as the days drift by, like the rapidly disappearing autumn leaves. She can feel her son’s closeness, like a piece of her heart being dangled just in front of her. If they find him- when they find him, things might begin to move very fast. They have done their absolute best to hide their progress from the night, even if it means waking up with the sun, but Yukami is canny and relentless. She’ll find them, Sariatu knows it just as certainly as she knows the moon will rise. She knows forces of nature, and she knows her family, and often the two are one and the same.

The truth is a looming, threatening thing.

It does not help that she loves him. The all encompassing, world-changing infatuation of youth has long since faded, she could not muster it up if she tried, but there is no other word for how she feels about him. When he makes her laugh, when he picks her up so they can keep going at midday, when he stays up with her through the lucid night and spars with her in caves when her mind is feeling especially clear. There is a word for what she wants to have for this bug, and that word might be family.

At the very least, she wants him to meet his son with the clearest eyes possible.

“How far are we?” she asks. It feels like they’ve been walking in the fog forever.

Beetle stares down the path, considering. “Only a few hours, I think,” he responds. “It’s been a while since I’ve come this way, but the trees look familiar here.”

They’re so close. Sariatu shivers.

“There’s something I’ve been meaning to talk to you about,” she begins feeling out of place. His earnest face beams down at her, all ears even though she isn’t sure if he has any.

“Please, go ahead.”

Monkey pokes Sariatu in the back of the knees, just hard enough to make her start walking again. It is hard, moving and thinking at the same time. “How- how much do you remember, about being human?”

“Almost nothing I haven’t told you already,” Beetle answer promptly, then frowns. “Have we had this conversation before? I feel like we’ve had this conversation before.”

“Maybe. Does it matter if neither of us can fully remember it?”

He laughs. “Now you’re getting philosophical on me. If a tree falls down in the woods, do the other trees hear it? I don’t know about being human. I remember being brave and fighting, or at least I think I do. I remember finding things that spoke to me, weapons, armour. So I thought, I must be a warrior. Either that or a very competent actor with a specific niche of roles. I remember songs sometimes, especially when you sing them. I remember the Beetle Clan, or at least _a_ clan. There was something I was loyal to once.” Sadness crosses his features like the clouds covering the sun. “But as soon as I think I have a memory it slips away.”

“Yes,” Sariatu murmurs, “I can understand that. You don’t have any memories of your family? What about Hanzo, can you remember him?”

Beetle looks almost alarmed in his concentration as he tries. Then he shakes his head. “No, not a thing. I’m sorry.”

“It’s not your fault, believe me,” she tells him firmly. “I just- I don’t know how to say this.”

“This way,” he says, leading them over a fallen branch in the way and further up the winding path. “Try. I promise, you can’t scare me. I just met your sister, she’s way scarier than you’ll ever be.”

Sariatu is less worried about frightening him, and more concerned about breaking his mind entirely. It is impossible to determine to exactitudes of the curse her sisters wrought. Yukami’s mild confusion had been promising however. If she thought there was a chance, however small, that Beetle might have remembered, then Sariatu actually had some hope of getting through to him.

She tried another tack. “Have you ever felt like we knew each other before this? Surely we must have met. Do you remember me?”

Again, Beetle’s face contorts with the exertion of memory. “I feel like we did? You seem familiar, somehow. Enough that I believed that you were Hanzo’s lady. It made sense.” Then, he has to go and turn it around on her. “What about you? Do you know who I was? It really sounds like you do.”

“I... have some suspicions,” Sariatu hedges.

“Well, if you figure it out, tell me. It would be nice to have a real name. Beetle just doesn’t have a very menacing ring to it, you know?” Their path is getting narrower. Overgrown red maples, as dark as blood, lean over it, half their branches stripped bare. The hair is standing up on the back of Monkey’s haunches and Sariatu suspects that if she had haunch hair it would be acting similarly. As it is, she’s cold. The chill of the Month of Frost has set in fast, though they are only a few days into it.

Still, paper-Hanzo points forward.

Sariatu tries to set her fears aside and live in the moment. Hanzo is next to her, fidgeting idly with the aged fletching on an arrow. He’s alive and well. All she has to do is talk to him.

And not frighten him. And convince him to still love her even though she brought his ruin. And do it before they find their son and things get complicated.

“H-Beetle,” she says. “You promised to look after Kubo if anything happened to me. I need to know that no matter what, you’ll keep that promise. Treat him like your own. Take care of him, he’ll need it.”

He looks at her. “Why, is something wrong? You’re acting weird. Look, we’re not too far from the fortress, I think if it weren’t for the mist we would be able to see it on that hill. We’re going to find your kid, and everything’s going to be okay.” Despite himself, he seems a little spooked, which just makes Sariatu even more worried that she’s doing everything wrong.

“I know- I just… there’s a lot I haven’t told you. You deserve to have your story back, even if it is complicated.”

“The _tell_ me,” he insists.

“It’s not that easy-”

He can’t shut up even when she’s trying to tell him the most important thing in the world. It’s more frustrating than watching a fly bang into a mesh screen over and over again. She recognizes the accidentally smug look on his face even as he opens his mouth, “I mean, it sort of is-”

“ _Hanzo_!”

“What?”

There’s a moment of silence, as they both catch themselves. His lips part in confusion as he realizes what he just said. Her heart races. Monkey sighs.

With perfect agility, she leaps up Beetle’s torso, almost pushing him to the ground with her weight. She grabs paper-Hanzo from between his horns with one hand then leaps to the ground, leaving Beetle to catch his balance.

Once all eyes are on her, Monkey points, carefully and deliberately, to the little paper man limp in her grasp. Then she points to Beetle, then back again.

“Oh. _Oh_.” Beetle looks to Sariatu, questioningly. “Am I…?”

She bites her lip. “I’m almost certain. The way Yukami looked at you really gave it away, and… you act like him, sometimes.”

It is still unspoken, and that feels safer. The words themselves might trigger some terrible spell. Words have power. Little implications and silent affirmations do not.

He has one hand over his heart, like is was beating in his breast as fast as hers is, and he’s looking at her like she’s suddenly made of kutani porcelain. Slowly, he says, “Then... Kubo?”

She nods. “Yes.”

With that, Beetle is all business again. “We should find him then,” he declares, and sets back up the path at a jog, leaving the others to catch up.

When Sariatu finally reaches him, he’s grinning like a fool.

All things considered, she thinks it went better than it could have.

  
  
  
  


After an adjustment period of about five minutes, he has questions.

Most of them are easy enough to answer. When had she known? How had it happened, why had he lived? Her family’s brand of sadism is not simple to explain, but she can try.

Others, neither of them has the answer to. What had his birthday been? What had happened in the chaos that had torn them apart and sent her to a village far away. She can remember Kubo losing his first eye, but not what had happened after, though surely something must have transpired. There had been fighting, Hanzo’s robe, a boat.

“We were married then?” Beetle marvels, staring back at her. He’s run into two low hanging tree branches so far.

Sariatu opens her mouth to answer, and then she realizes what is looming in front of them. It’s half a ruin, the ghost of a building built from the very mist. Tattered banners flutter in the breeze. The bridge over the moat is askew, as if the foundations themself had been shaken by the violence eleven years ago.

She’s glad she told him. A prescient weight on her chest, too violent to be mere mortal fear, is telling her she’s run out of time.

“It’s getting dark soon,” Sariatu says, though they have at least a half an hour even in these shorter days. Monkey starts to scout out the front entrance, covering their angles as if there might still be archers behind the crumbling walls or hidden on skeleton timbers.

“But we were married?” Beetle presses as he hurries after them. Sariatu looks back, confused for a second.

“We _are_ still married, I think. Neither of us were in a state to get a divorce.”

He takes her hand with two of his, chivalrous to the core. Even though Sariatu rolls her eyes, some part of her wants to giggle like a little girl, especially when he looks at her.

“Neither of us can remember what we’re doing half the time,” he says thoughtfully. “I don’t think we’re going to get anything better than this.”

With that, they start to pick their way over the bridge, occasionally holding onto each other for balance. The structure hasn’t held human weight in a decade, it’s a sensible precaution.

The front door, once sturdy, iron barred wood, has been knocked open and only one half still clings to its hinges. The other half is on the ground, a full four feet away. Rogue leaves are scattered on the floor, along with broken wood, pottery, loose rope.

“I know this place,” Beetle says softly.

Even though she wishes she didn’t, Sariatu does as well. It is like seeing an old friend, aged and on the point of death.

Not even the bugs have been here, though the maple trees seem to be thriving amid the bones and general decay. Once, Hanzo had gotten her a coat with red maple painted on it, and said it made her look divine. Then he’d laughed at his own joke.

Paper-Hanzo is still pointing forward into the ever deepening shadows. One of them goes and finds a lantern. The glow is reassuringly mundane in the face of this disaster.

Walls have been broken down, beams lay in hallways, and entire sections of roof are gone. It’s hard to navigate the wreckage safely, much less quietly. Beetle’s shoulders are too wide for some of the holes they’re trying to fit into. Sariatu’s robes keep getting caught on things.

Between the muffled clatters and swearing, she almost doesn’t hear the distant voice, high and young.

Someone is talking.

Sariatu gestures for silence, is relieved when she almost immediately gets it, and creeps forward. The child’s voice sharpens as she moves closer.

“...You’re a very small tree,” he says, “And also very dead. I don’t suppose _you_ know where they hid the food? Surely there were snacks around somewhere.”

She knows Kubo’s voice more surely than her own face. She moves almost of her own accord, vaulting lightly over a beam and running down the hall with all the grace she has lacked in these last weeks. Beetle and Monkey follow more slowly, trying to be silent.

It doesn’t matter, she waits for them. She has to, she cannot pull apart the screen in front of her alone. They all look so young in the portrait painted on the sliding doors, Kubo still a formless lump with a smiling face.

Beetle freezes next to her and inhales sharply, looking at his own, different features. Reflexively, his hand goes up to stroke his chin, as if to say, ‘I had a beard?’

Then, the doors slam apart before them.

Sariatu doesn’t think, she charges. Her sister (Karasu she realizes with some shock, not Yukami who followed them but Karasu) is caught off guard for some reason. She looks as terrified of Sariatu as Sariatu is of her.

“How-” she manages, before Sariatu hits her firmly in the stomach with the hilt of the Sword Unbreakable and tackles her. With the extra weight of the armour behind her, she has enough momentum to carry her sister to the ground, if not keep her there.

From somewhere to the right, Kubo sounds panicked. “Auntie, what’s happening? You promised!” he cries, which raises even more questions. Sariatu is too busy grappling with a half airborne sister to contemplate much though. Karasu is hovering slightly, and only by pressing her full weight on her can Sariatu keep her close to the ground. Pinning her arms is a lost cause, which means she’ll find her kusarigama soon enough.

Sariatu finds it when it slices into her upper arm, cutting through layers of silk and into soft flesh. She gasps, and hits the ground as Karasu twists out from under her and floats up towards the ceiling. It is an unfortunate habit, Sariatu remembers, of those who can fly to take full advantage of it when fighting those who cannot.

Beetle has an arrow trained on her, and Monkey is holding Kubo behind her in a corner. Sariatu catches her breath. Among the low rafters, Karasu does the same thing.

“You’re dead!” her sister tells her, and shockingly it’s not a threat. She sounds genuinely off put by this development.

“What’s going on!” Kubo demands, through what sounds like a mouth full of monkey fur.

He can’t see them, Sariatu realizes as she peels her eyes away from her sister and looks at her son. It makes sense, last time she’d looked at his face an eyeball was being torn out of it, but it still breaks her heart. After all these years, they’re not allowed to win.

Other than the scarring around his empty, sunken eye-sockets, he seems almost well. His face is round, like he’s been eating. His clothing, silvery starched pants and his father’s worn robe over a white collared undershirt, is clean.

Rather than address him directly, Sariatu looks back up at her sister, who is swinging her weapon menacingly. In closed quarters like this, no fight is a good fight.

“I’m not dead,” she says as evenly as she can. “And I want my son back.”

“Mother?”

  
  
  
  
  


Kubo stopped struggling. He wasn’t sure what sort of monster was holding him, possibly a bear, but he wouldn’t put up a fight if it was a bear working with his mother.

It had all happened so fast. One minute he’d been trying to charm Karasu, unsure of how he could escape but determined to try since she seemed to be willing to listen to him, at least. Then she’d shoved him under a desk and all the heavens had broken loose.

He’d been so scared Grandfather and Yukami had found them and they’d both be in trouble, him for running away and her for giving him a measure of mercy.

Instead, his mother’s voice, rough with pain and stronger than he remembered it being in years, echoed in his skull. She’d come to save him.

She’d come at exactly the wrong time.

“Mother,” Kubo said again, mouth dry. The furry creature trapping him in the corner let up a little, and he could move his limbs again. He couldn’t run to her like he wants too though.

His mother was not dead. Or at least, if she was, she’d come back as a heroic ghost, and he’s willing to take that.

“Kubo.” She said his name like it’s poetry, on a matter suitably wistful and grand. In the background, someone was crying, and Kubo realized he had no idea how many people were in the room. This new mother, who made his aunts cry out and had allies at her beck and call, he felt like he’d never met her before.

“Was this your plan all along?” Aunt Karasu accused, and it was mostly directed at him.

Kubo shook his head so quickly he knocked it against a wall. “No, I don’t know what’s going on. I thought Mother was dead, that’s what you told me.”

It was miserable to feel trapped and on the defensive again. He’d escaped. Sure, he’d been found again a few days after, but the escape as an act of rebellion remained. It wasn’t right, to be scared again when you’d already run away.

That prompted a surprised snort of laughter from his mother. “The lies in this family never stop, do they?”

“Only because you started them,” Karasu retorted, anger just barely masking her confusion. She was about to pounce, Kubo could hear it in her voice.

Sure enough, there was a crash, then two smaller ones. He winced, but was glad there was no screaming, none of the telltale sounds of anyone getting injured.

A man spoke up then, probably the last person in the room. (It wasn’t a big room. Kubo had paced all around it while arguing with Karasu earlier.) “Please stop breaking things,” he huffed, a little out of breath, like he’d just tried to keep up with an airborne demigoddess.

“All of you, please stop!” Kubo pleaded before the fight could continue. “Mother, Auntie, all the rest of you,” he gestured to the room at large. “Stop please, I don’t want anyone to get hurt for my sake.”

“Oh, Kubo-” Mother sighed.

Karasu choked on offense. “For your sake, little nephew? Did you consider that before you ran away, before you made your Grandfather angry? Do you realize what he will do if he finds you with these two? I knew we shouldn’t have left the bug alive, and I don’t even know my traitor sister survived,”

“That bug is my husband,” Mother objected, which just made Kubo even more confused, “And I lived because your other traitor sister let me. Bring it up with her.”

There were even more crashes and then a wounded cry from Karasu. “She wouldn’t…”

“She did,” Mother said, out of breath but holding her own. Something else broke and a small object whooshed through the air a few feet in front of Kubo and hit the wall with a twang. “We saw her a few days ago, in fact. Both of us, with this armor and this sword. She didn’t tell you?”

A splinter of cracking wood and the metallic clang of one weapon against the other was all the answer she got.

Kubo tried a different tack with his captor as the battle raged, a symphony of chains clinking and horrible clashes. “Please let me go,” he said firmly. “I’m not a child, I can help. I don’t want my mother and my aunt to kill each other.”

He didn’t, he realized. Mother was alive, and that was like learning the sun was coming back after an eclipse, but Auntie Karasu hadn’t dragged him right back to the Moon Kingdom as soon as she’d found him and that was progress.

Slowly, the strong, long arms keeping him trapped lowered, and he wormed his way out of the corner, hand on the hilt of his sword.

“Auntie?” he called over the fracas, weary of more flying arrows or rogue projectiles, “Mother, please, don’t hurt her.” Logic tells him he should be asking his aunt not to hurt his mother, but his instincts say otherwise.

“Kubo,” his mother said in a warning tone, “Please, the grownups are talking,”

“You heartless, treacherous, _human_!” Karasu howled, “You don’t know the meaning of family. You poisoned our home, and now you try to poison our minds as well. Why can’t you and your thief just disappear?”

The scrape of metal on metal meant they were locked. It was like stone being torn apart, painful to even hear.

“You stole my son!” Mother fired back, “Did you think I wasn’t going to try to get him, especially given how easy you made it. You always have to be cruel, don’t you. You couldn’t kill Hanzo and Yukami couldn’t kill me.” The sound of his father’s name is almost enough to distract Kubo, but he has a mission, and a family to try to keep as alive as gods can be. Answers can wait.

“You’re lying,” Karasu snaps, but the scraping stops, and they break apart with a whirl. Kubo runs blindly between them, arms outstretched. Mother won’t hurt him, and now he knows Karasu won’t either, probably.

There are matching disappointed sighs in him, from opposite sides of the room, but neither of them try to push past him. “Please, stop,” Kubo tries one more time.

Mother speaks over his head. “Go home, Karasu. Ask our sister for the truth. I- I don’t want to hurt you but I will if I have to, and you know you’re outnumbered.”

“Four to one if you count the kid,” The man pipes up helpfully.

There’s a hurt silence, and Kubo swears he feels eyes on him. He turns to where he thinks his aunt is, remembering what Grandfather said about simply knowing the space. There is where it opens up onto the courtyard, there is where she can fly away.

“Auntie…” he trails off, unsure of what exactly to say. “Thank you.”

Even the sound of her shallow, inhuman breathing is hurt, every delicate inhale sharp and pained. He knows she’s only breathing for his sake, to let him know where she is, and that she, on some level, cares.

Then, she stops, and with a gust of air, she’s gone.

  
  
  
  


Kubo’s mother had been soft the last time he’d hugged her, smelling faintly of the sea and their campfire. Her lap had been a sprawling place he could get curl up on.

Now, she was wearing armor, and she smelled like sweat and forest outside. Her arms were still big enough to hold him close, and her hair still tickled his nose when he pressed his face into her shoulder.

She rocked for a few seconds on her knees, still holding him, and Kubo thought she might pick him up like a baby again and never let him go. He wouldn’t have minded.

“My baby, my sweet baby,” she whispered, and Kubo felt himself close to tears.

“Mother, I missed you so much.” _I thought you were gone forever._

“I know. My beautiful brave boy. You survived. I am so proud of you.”

He let himself collapse into her embrace as she rocked back and forth. Even the blood oozing from a shallow wound on her arm wasn’t enough to make him shift. Finally her armor became too uncomfortable, and he pulled back a little, just enough to look up at her.

“How did you know I was here?” he asked.

She laughed again, a noise that had been rare over the last few years. “Magic. And some help from a friend. Are you alright, did they hurt you?”

“I’m fine,” Kubo promised. “Other than the eye thing, I mean. Grandfather was, he wanted to love me, I think. He just didn’t know how.” It felt strange, making excuses for that awful place, but his mother cooed like she understood.

“I know what being up there does to you. I thought for sure they’d have blinded you.”

He knew what she meant, oddly enough. “They did, for a while, but I figured it, out. I am half-human, after all. They couldn’t, they couldn’t make me think the way they wanted to. It made them angry, and it made me angry and then I ran away. That’s why I’m here.” All the words he had bottled up over the past weeks, months, threatened to spill out. Real love was like rain after a drought, you went so power-mad with it you didn’t realize your rice crops were being flooded. “I ran away! Grandfather was so mad.”  


Mother gasped, “Are you safe? Your aunt, she didn’t hurt you? We knew you’d gotten out somehow, and I was so scared when I found her here with you.”

“No, no,” Kubo looked for the right words for what had happened with Karasu and came up blank. “She found me here, you’re right, but she was scared for me. I think- I think she might have been worried grandfather was going to kill me. I convinced her to let me stay a little longer, until his temper settled down. I was trying to win her around when you came in.”

“You can’t reason with them, Kubo,” his mother warned. “I know what it is to live in that place for all your life. It’s almost impossible to break away.”

“I guess,” Kubo said, and hugged her again, impulsively. “When did you start wearing armor?”

Hands moved almost instinctively to the sword at her side, and Kubo followed them, placing a hand on top of the hilt. “Three guesses,” Mother told him, “I know I’ve told you this story before.”

Kubo gasped as realization hit. “The Armor of legends! You have the Sword,” he patted it, “And the Breastplate,” he tapped it as well, marvelling at the delicate patterns engraved on the surface. When he reached up, he found her head bare. “But you haven’t found the Helmet yet.”

“No,” Mother admitted. “We got distracted. _Someone_ decided to make a jailbreak.” There was a cough from above him, and Mother glanced up, hair swinging. “Oh, oh, I forgot-”

“Story of my life,” someone whispered, and Kubo nearly burst out laughing.

“Stop it. Kubo, I have people to introduce you to. First, I want you to meet Miss Monkey. She’s helped me on this journey, especially during the times when I was... less of myself.”

A soft padded hand, backed with fur, touched Kubo’s and as he reached out, long fingers intertwined with his. “Wait, Mister Monkey?”  
  
The monkey pulled his- her- hand back and pulled his hair gently. “Miss Monkey,” his mother corrected. I brought her to life, I’m afraid, and I wouldn’t have made it this far without her.”

It took Kubo a second to remember his manners. He bowed as much as he could without letting go of his mother. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

Gently, his mother guided his gaze over. “This is the second person who helped me. I met him on my journeys and he was invaluable in helping me find the two pieces of the armour. He is… very special to me. When we first met, he couldn’t remember much either, but we thought he might have worked for you father-” Kubo clutched at the sleeves of his robe and grinned, “Then, certain things came to light. I really, don’t know how to say this.”

For the first time since they’d remet, she sounded as lost as Kubo remembered her.

An oddly stiff, spiny hand, like one encased in armor, took Kubo’s. “Let me handle it, love,” the man said, and Kubo shrank back, confused, into his mother’s chest.

“Kubo, I can’t remember you, and you almost certainly can’t remember me since you were a baby last time we met. I can’t remember your mother very well either, and she barely remembers I exist first thing in the morning. I think I’ve gotten off track. The point is, for a long time I wasn’t sure who I was. I recognize that you cannot appreciate it on account of not having, you know, eyes, but I do currently look like a very large bug and that’s another point against me…”

“Just tell me,” Kubo ordered. “I can deal with having a new step-dad who’s a monster, or whatever. I only remembered my dad’s name last week, you don’t have to worry about competition or anything.”

“No, nooooo, no, no. Kubo, I am your father. I’m- I’m Hanzo.”

Kubo froze.

“Father?”

“Yeah, son?” It sounded, awkward, stilted, even, but Kubo had just gotten out of a court of lies and he knew what they sounded like.

“I thought you were dead,” he said, and realized it was a dumb thing to say.

His father chuckled, “It’s kind of been a day for that, hasn’t it?”

Kubo squeezed his hand, checking that he was solid. He was, rather more than a human ought to have been.

Mother started to stand, carrying Kubo up with her, as if she refused to let him go.

“I know we have a lot to work out,” the man who was Kubo’s father said, “But I suspect your family will be back soon. We need to find a place to run to.”

“I want to go home,” Kubo whispered.

“It’s not safe,” his mother said with regret. “We can’t do that to the village. We need to find the helmet. My father and sisters will come, no matter where we hide. We need to be able to fight them.”

“There might be records of my search here,” the man suggested. “It used to be my study.”

“Really?” Kubo asked, suddenly understanding why Karasu had raged when she’d first found him here.

Four feet bounded over the floor to them, and Sariatu let go of Kubo with one arm to take an object from Miss Monkey.

Paper unfurled gently next to his ear, and he shifted to face the sound instinctively. His mother stiffened like a corpse.

“I know where the helmet is.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annotations  
> 1\. Kutani ware, which I reference, was a type of very expensive porcelain. I chose it because it's not a reference to a place in particular and it's an older style. The second choice was celadon, another style of fine pottery. Either way, Beetle is super in love with her.   
> 2\. I spent, like, a shocking amount of time googling local forest foods that come in season in autumn for this story. People need to eat, and sadly they weren't ever near water long enough for fish. So instead you get lots of chestnuts and persimmons.   
> 3\. Speaking of seasons, there's a fairly strict timeline for this fic. It starts in the middle of August, the full moon, at Bon festival. Then it continues mostly during late September and October. At this point it's very, very early November, which is going to be mildly important later. One of the older names for the month of November is the Month of Frost, which I reference here. The name for the month of October, which I didn't get a chance to work in, is the Month of Gods or, depending on translation, the Month Without Gods. So we spend the Month of Gods in the Kingdom of the Moon, then Kubo leaves just in time for the new moon and the new month.   
> 4\. Spent a lot of time pausing Netflix and inspecting every detail of the sets at Hanzo's fortress, lads. Underrated details: the super dead bonsai tree, and the tiny archery set he kept next to his desk for when he got bored, and the floral crest different from that of the Beetle clan that shows up only in his office (possibly the crest of a liege lord) and the weird trees that grow there. I swear, they have bamboo stems but maple leaves. Literally the best guess I have is heavenly bamboo but even that sounds wrong. What's going on Laika?


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally the penultimate chapter is up. It's.... pretty long even by the standards of this fic. The last one might end up being a monster. Wrapping up these last pieces to my satisfaction has been a lot harder than I expected, even though all the rough plot pieces have been sketched out since last October. I want the execution to be flawless, and on some level I don't want to let go of this story. 
> 
> Sorry the wait was a few months. I just want everything thing to be perfect.

Once upon a time, when the night was beautiful and bright, three sisters were made out of pieces of a sword. Reshaped from precious steel by their father’s will they awoke in a world of absolute rigidity.  
  
Yukami still remembered those initial moments of existence, and how she’d known in an instant who she was and what she was designed to be. There was a tongue curling satisfaction in certainty, and she opened her eyes for the first time, content.  
  
The first face she saw was her sister’s. Sariatu was older by scant minutes and already steady as a rock. (Not that Karasu and Yukami were unsteady, no, anything less than perfection would have been intolerable,but they were... new. Still soft from the forge fires.)  
  
Sariatu was beautiful as well, jewel bright like the decorative handle she was made of, with a core like the tang of a sword, blunt and strong. Yukami felt her other sister rise up behind her and turn too for certainty in this brilliant new world, but her eyes remained locked on Sariatu, who held out her hands.  
  
“Sisters,” she said, the first word they’d ever heard. Karasu and Yukami both took one of her hands, marveling at the sense of touch. Then, as one, they turned to their father.  
  
In those first, pivotal moments, it was just three. The Moon King, who made them and now claimed them as his own blood, was an important afterthought.  
  
No one had worried about it at the time. Why separate what once was whole? Why break a perfectly good weapon in three? They were functionally parts of the same whole, there was no shame if they acted like it. Even their honored father had treated them as extensions of the same creature, Sariatu the head, Yukami and Karasu the obedient limbs.  
  
And so it was, and so it would have always been, if Sariatu hadn’t destroyed everything.  
  
Because once upon a time, a silly goddess, made of frivolous things, thought it would be a good idea to split up. She left her sisters behind and plunged headlong into fight, so certain of her victory. And somewhere in a den of beasts, a temple of rotting flesh and broken bodies, she was defeated, not in body (she always was boldest and brightest of them all, best at magic and most controlled though she lacked her sisters’ lethality) but in mind. A creature of the crawling earth dared to steal her heart.  
  
She spared him. She returned to her sisters and told them of a battle fought and won, assured them that there was no more blood to spill. Then, when all eyes turned away from her, she returned to her pitiful beau in secret. She brought him magic and told him of the ways of the gods. With her every word, she betrayed her family and kingdom.  
  
Her sisters did not know, did not realize the betrayal going on under their nose. There were many places to hide on the moon, many reasons to withdraw into seclusion in the pursuit of perfection, and many centuries to whittle away. They took no notice of a few years of distraction and missing hours, not until she disappeared entirely.  
  
They searched for her tirelessly. Their father, incensed by such an affront to his power, sent out all his armies to scour the cosmos while he turned his moonbeam gaze upon the earth. Minor divinities searches dragons’ lairs and deep dark crevices, amid the billowing veils of supernovas and in the golden realm of the sun where all creatures of the night grew helpless. No one even considered she might abscond of her own free will. She was first in her father’s cold affections, highest in esteem. There was no reason for her to leave.

When they finally found her in a hidden castle with her human husband and a child, a baby, few could believe what had become of her. The king turned on his two remaining daughters, accusing them of hiding this treachery, interrogating them harshly about what they had known of their sister’s intentions. Only once they’d repudiated her and sworn their innocence did he finally turn his fury towards his wayward child.  
  
Such insolence could not stand, he declared.

For their part, the sisters left behind mourned as much as they could while armies mustered around them. In their rage they tore away their pretty trappings and donned dark feathers and bare metal. Loveliness had always been their sister’s business. They were steel, nothing but steel.

The combined forces of the moon tore through the mortal fool’s castle like an arrow through rice paper. Warriors fell by the dozens, protecting a woman who never should have walked the earth to begin with. The two sisters left behind found the one who stole their final third, and pinned him to the ground to squirm as heavenly hosts looked for Sariatu and her child. They had escaped, though not without losing something. Their father had taken the boy’s eye, for he was determined to bring his grandson back to the moon with them and certain alterations would have to be made to ensure he could survive there without seeing too much.

Vexingly, Sariatu was not found and as sunrise drew closer the sisters became frustrated. Her husband, still clinging to life, was growing obnoxious. But killing him, they decided, simply wouldn’t do. It was too quick for such a criminal, too easy for one who had upset the balance of the universe itself.

So, he was changed, and left there, moaning in pain. Yukami and Karasu flitted home and tried to accustom themselves to this new manner of existence. They had been living without a sister for almost a year, surely it would not be hard to survive without one again.

It proved impossible.

Once, they had been the Mitsu Boshi, the Heart Mansion, the Three Enclosures of Heaven, inextricably tied and beholden to each other and only, eternally three. It was a good number, three, proper and filial. Now they were lost.

What was a sword without a hilt? Nothing but steel and sharp edges, as likely to cut the wielder as an enemy. Sariatu left them directionless and bare.

Her selfishness was hereditary, it seemed. Now her son had abandoned them as well. Father had held such high hopes for him when he had first been brought to them, and he had gone and dashed them to the ground. Stupid, reckless child.

Yukami floated back and forth, smoked with a passion, and recited her story to herself, because raging about the unchangeable past was better than dwelling on the uncertain future. Anger was easy, too easy for her. The rancor she held towards Sariatu was a reliable variable, and that made it something of a comfort object in these trying time. She clung to it.

Through the screen, she could see the interrogation taking place within silhouetted like some exotic shadow play. Hands gestured rapidly, but the voices stayed too low to hear.

She snarled. The woman had remained stubbornly silent for too long. They had lost days to her recalcitrance, and Yukami was rapidly nearing the end of her patience. The Moon King had ran out long ago.

It was time to stop this game- or Sariatu would find her son before they did.

The sight of her face, her once fine features marred by age and injury but still so gracious, that once-human man by her side once more, burned in the back of Yukami’s mind. She’d had the the _chestplate_ and the _sword_.

Yukami threw open the door and glared down the proud lords and ladies within. None dared look straight at her mask.

“Princess,” said the Pole Star, an all too powerful bureaucrat with too much of the Big Dipper at his beck and call. He considered himself something of a just god. Yukami thought his eyes were too sharp, a dangerous thing in a place where the king himself was blind. “We were making progress.”

“You’ve been making progress for hours,” she snapped, “I’m done waiting.”

The woman still sitting on the ground, milder than spring rain, shifted slightly. It was a mistake. It only make Yukami refocus all her rage on her.

Nayotake-no-Kaguya was such a shining creature, pale, luminescent, and distressed, still wearing the colors of spring. Pale plum and the exact shade of decaying leaves, and a green so bright it threatened to burst to life before Yukami’s eyes. An absolute disgrace. She inhaled sharply and nearly choked on demon smoke, which only left her more enraged.

“Princess?” the Pole Star said with concern as Yukami breathed noxious fire. The woman still did not look up from her lap.

It was that title again. A nonsense word, a false honor brandished at her like a weapon. Hierarchy, was, of course, required, order needed to be maintained, but it was such silliness. She was not a princess, she had never been a princess. She was a weapon, and the least these bowing toadies could do was treat her like one.

“Out,” she hissed, “Out, all of you. Leave me with her.”

The Northern Nuisance made a move as if to try and talk her down. Yukami laid one hand on a sword hilt and stared. Even with a mask, one could get a point across. “Our sovereign is not happy,” she reminded him. _And I am still in his good graces. Barely._

The paper men scattered to the wind, fluttering away on a stiff breeze like so many of Sariatu and Father’s creations.

She was left to examine the miscreant who had let her oh so precious nephew escape. There was not much to look at, from the outside she looked almost identical to any number of court ladies. Layered robes showed pale, tasteful colors, muted and pure; out of season, yes, but not unforgivably so. A sheer overcoat edged with feathers showed provenance, and her allegiance for what was they to be loyal to but the place from whence you came? Anger subsiding in the still and quiet of the room, Yukami circled her three times, then changed tactics and swooped in from above.

Still, she did not flinch. Only the slightest motion suggested she was even aware of Yukami’s presence.

It was hard to interrogate a statue, Yukami reflected, resting midair above her victim. She leaned over to look at Nayotake-no-Kaguya’s face one more time.

Almost upside down and only inches apart, their eyes met.

A peal of laughter burst out of the Shining Lady, so sharp and unexpected that Yukami nearly tumbled out of the air. Almost as soon as it had begun the moment was over. The Nayotake-no-Kaguya retreated back into her armor of silence. Still, it was enough.

One weakness, that was all Yukami needed. Feet back on solid ground, she knelt before her victim and took her chin in one hand. The soft flesh of the woman’s cheeks dimpled under her grip, nothing but give.

“Do you find me amusing, you who have taken my nephew from his home?” Yukami demanded.

“No,” her voice did not tremble but her eyes were far away. A human might have felt pity, but Yukami was a god.

“But you laughed,” Yukami observed, “And you let the child go,”

For some reason Kaguya felt the need to defend herself. Another mistake. “He asked for help visiting the earth. I could not deny him, he outranked me.”

“You did not think that your king would be upset?”

“I did not think,” she said evenly, “I only obeyed.”

It was so brazenly a lie, a betrayal, flat out _treason_ , that Yukami had to fight the urge to dig her fingers into those moon round cheeks until they split like an overripe peach. It would be pointless, the traitor was just as immortal as she was, had drunk of the same elixir and wore the same soft glow of starlight. Disgusted, she turned away.

Fighting fury and staring at the far wall because if she looked at her interrogatee she would want to throw her in a lake, Yukami spoke. “You did not think, you did not consider anything. You only acted. By that action you have thrown a kingdom into chaos. Your thoughtlessness, your reckless behavior, allowed a child of royal blood to be lost. Now your selfishness prevents us from finding him. You have doomed him. He is as good as dead thanks to you.”

There was a rustle of silk, a soft, too-kind murmur. “He was already dying. Your family would have destroyed him utterly.”

Yukami spun and bore down on her like a bird of prey, stopping her sword mere inches from the lady’s neck. “He was safe!” she cried, “He was not alone in a rotting world of animals who could never understand him. His Grandfather was still determined to save him, and you must know that is no longer the case. He will die.”

The child, a shallow echo of his mother, a living memory, a half-real squirming thing of flesh and thick red blood, had never truly been Yukami’s concern. But now that he had been taken, she found herself oddly protective of the nephew she had barely cared for. The Earth would not steal another family member from her.

Kaguya flinched and a hint of guilt passed over her face, but she held firm. “He was miserable. A prisoner determined to escape will find an exit one way or another. I simply ensured he had a fighting chance. I do not know where he went, but even if I did I would not tell you. I… he was so sad.”

“So you pitted him against his family?”

There was a second of hesitation, as if even the traitor had second thoughts about what she was going to say. Still, she said it. “Clearly, family fighting family is not that much of a concern to you. Didn’t you kill your own sister?”

Yukami shoved her, hard. It was not particularly gracious way to end an argument, or even the most violent of the options, but more desperately than anything Yukami needed her to shut up. Nayotake-no-Kaguya toppled backward, then after a second pushed herself up on one arm. It didn’t matter, Yukami was already out the door.

The Lord of the Pole Star was just outside. At Yukami’s return he raised an eyebrow.

“She’s useless,” she reported, desperate to get out, to escape this place and these people. She was suddenly very glad of the ceramic semblance covering her face from view. Unwieldy as it could be, it protected her from weakness, from being seen being weak. “Kill her, if you even can, or see if there’s somewhere to lock her up. You have better things to be doing, my nephew is still missing.”

Then she fled.

Amid the many wing and gardens of the palace, there was only one place where she could calm her temper and be assured of privacy. The rabbits’ courtyard was remote and ill-favoured, and there was a soothing nature to it, the thump of mallet against pestle and the soft hustle of work.

When she felt especially upset she would interrupt the flow to dip one finger in the mercurial elixir of immortality, taste a little bit of her own power and let the it buoy her. With Sariatu weighing so heavily on her mind, the sight of the thick, silvery liquid only made Yukami scowl.

She had shown Kubo this place once, she recalled, and then, because his curiosity was as much a danger to him as the people around him, had to ask a lesser attendant of the court to watch out for him. The North Star, curse him, had gotten wind of it and hung around for weeks.

With Kubo gone, however, this small refuge was secure once more. Few denizens of the court would willing lurk here, not with how _alive_ it was.

In the center of the small square of earth stood a tree. What sort, Yukami did not know. What mattered was how mortal it was. It bore hard fruit from branches with different shaped leaves, and it was made of simple wood and soft plant fibers, and that alone was almost unforgivable to those used to trees of precious metal and unbreakable gemstones. Once in a while it shed a few leaves, further cementing the disgrace in its nature.

Around the base of the tree, in a wild sort of garden decipherable only to the rabbits themselves, were the herbs that made immortality possible. Though they were technically of the realm of deities, they grew and died and that was a shameful thing as well.

Yukami had been carrying out her father’s orders and passing judgement on the world below for long centuries. She could handle a little dose of mortality from time to time without flinching, and the messier aspects of all that went on inside the courtyard wasn’t enough to make her shrink away.

Still, she didn’t like to _see_ it if she didn’t have to, so she closed her eyes and focused on the rhythmic pound of the mallets, the snuffling of the rabbits, and the assurance of eternity.

Some hours passed, and the seething hatred that seemed like it could fill her up began to subside.

Then someone slammed her into a wall.

She knew her sister’s hands around her neck when she felt them, and it was not surprising to see Karasu’s face as her eyes flew open. It had been that sort of day.

“Why is she alive?” Karasu challenged. There was no question of who _she_ was. Only their flesh and ore could inspire such emotion.

Karasu has seen Sariatu. Karasu had discovered the only secret Yukami had ever kept from her and now all hell was going to break loose.

At least she could get her say in first, Yukami decided, pulling her pipe out of her belt and summoning the fire demon outside. A roar of choking smoke rose up between them, forcing Karasu back and giving Yukami room to breath.

“I can explain,” she said.

Karasu batted the curling fingers of smoke away and snapped her teeth. “Please, try to tell me why our sister is down there, alive and well, with her husband and her son. Tell me why she said you knew, why you lied to us.”

There were no good ways to excuse what she had done, only that she had seen her sister’s face and wanted her to suffer something far worse than death. That she had been selfish, unforgivably so.

“You took the boy,” she said slowly, “And you left me with her. She was so heartbroken, and I hated her so much. I did not want to put her out of her misery. It was a mistake.” Such a simplification of that night, the moonlight and the silver.

“You _lied_ ,” Karasu accused.

“Once it was done I knew father would not accept it,” she explained, shocked by how steady her voice had remained. The steady thump of the rabbits’ work kept her slow and calm.

“That’s no excuse,” Karasu said, but remarkably her anger was fading. Perhaps she had lost enough to rage already. “Sister, she has the boy.”

Sariatu had reclaimed her child, and would take eleven years and all the forces of heaven to find them again. Yukami was more pleased than she had expected. The status quo was a heady drug. “Then it is done.”

It was the wrong thing to say. The smoldering situation reignited itself with a start, as Karasu threw her kusarigama sickle first into a nearby pillar. “How callous of you to say that! You knew she was alive, you knew what she was capable of, you could have stopped her!”

There were many things that Yukami could have done, certainly. She could have made more of an effort to follow Sariatu, but what was the point when she was wily and knowledgeable of her enemy’s limitations? She could have told Father… but that would not have been wise. Their family was shattered enough as it was. Now, even she and Karasu were at odds, and they were two halves of a single blade, identical in their origin and power.

Realizing this horrible reality, Yukami slumped, recalled the demon to her pipe, and let down her defenses. If Karasu wanted to strike her down, she could. They were both immortal here, and with the elixir of eternal life so close they could duel for eons without suffering true injuries.

“Sister, I cannot lose you too,” she said.

Karasu stood still for a moment, as if weighing her options. To maim, or not to maim. Eventually she dropped the chain from her hand.

“You told me our sister was dead.”

“To me, she was. It did not seem foolish at the time.”

She could all but hear the curl of Karasu’s lip, even behind her serene mask. “But it was.” There was a period of quiet, punctuated only by the beating of the mallets against the pestle of the gods. The rabbits had not stopped their work even when weapons were drawn. “You know,” Karasu said after a pause, “This was where I would fetch the food for the boy. The rabbits make pounded rice balls for themselves, and harvest plants here. They need to eat, they’re more alive than we are.”

Yukami nodded, she had seen them pounding mochi once in a while and nibbling on the moon-shaped balls with chestnuts and small roots. Carried out by rabbits rather than obnoxious humans, the habits of mortality were almost charming.

“He hated it after a while,” Karasu recalled almost wistfully. “He never said as much, but the servants said he was leaving more on his plate than before.”

_He was miserable._

Yukami clenched her jaw. “Hmm. What is our next course of action then?”

This was almost back to normal. Strategizing, making plans. Usually they had their Father’s guidance to rely on, but that was less and less reliable.

Karasu dipped to pick up her chain, then flicked her wrist, yanking the heavy sickle back into her hand. “I know not, Sister. However-”

“Yes?”

They had been so long together, even the masks did not prevent their communication. Small… incidents aside, Yukami still knew her sister better than she knew anyone.

She knew Karasu was scared.

“We were three once,” she finished half-heartedly. “When this all ends, let us seek to be three again?”  
  
_Now_ , Yukami wondered, _does she mean our sister or the boy_?

  


 

Little Hanzo does not make it through the journey back. His paper body is weather-worn and water stained when it finally gives in, and the magic shaping him is wearing thin. It is not- should not be- unexpected. To keep a being of magic together when it has already fulfilled it’s purpose is difficult. Such delicate constructs are not made to last.  
  
He brought her family back to her. Sariatu does not mourn him, and perhaps that makes her as bad as her sisters, as her father. She does not care. Kubo is with her again, hand in hers, bright and mind-numbing as the sun (her son). She can think of little else.  
  
Hanzo takes it harder. He and the little samurai were fond of each other, as fond as twin souls could be. A memory of her husband and her memoryless husband. The night that small Hanzo finally stops moving, he cries.  
  
They bury him under a bare cherry tree the next morning, before they go on their way, and say the prayers Sariatu never got to say the first time her husband died.  
  
Much to her surprise, she cries as well. Kubo holds her hand so tightly it goes numb and after a few minutes, sets them back on the road.  
  
The days go fast with him there. His magical skills are sharper, his hands quicker, and he holds a sword like he almost knows what he is doing. Sariatu gives him her shamisen and hopes he won’t have to draw his moon-steel blade.  
  
With Kubo at their side, they almost fly back to the village. It is almost enough to make up for the sudden swell in Sariatu’s headaches and empty seconds. The bright surge of determination and divine power she had used to fuel her quest is fading, and she is frightened of what will happen when it flickers out entirely.  
  
  


  


Being blind had been hard enough in a place where he could memorize every turn and floorboard. In a strange forest full of unknown obstacles, Kubo found it impossible to manage. He could fly them- and had across the water, his mother guiding him with her voice and steadying his uncertain magic- but walking amid a thicket of obstacles tested even the limits of his power.

After a few false starts, his father scooped him up and settled him firmly on his shoulders. It wasn’t a bad situation, aside from the occasional low branch that came sweeping out of nowhere at him. The sun beat down on them through unseen shadows, bathing the smooth chitin of Hanzo’s carapace in warmth and his father’s even pace made for a lulling rocking after a while. All Kubo had to do was hold on and try not to kick his feet to much.

“How are you holding up, sprout?” Hanzo (He’d decided to call him Hanzo. Father felt odd, and Beetle was a silly name for people) asked after a very short while. Perhaps he was as easily bored as Kubo was. He’d clearly gotten it from somewhere and it wasn’t the mother who could spend whole days staring into the middle distance.

“I’m okay,” Kubo reported, “Can you see my mom? I can’t hear her anymore.”

Hanzo chuckled. “She’s up ahead, outpacing us. I think she really wants to get back to the village.”

Again, that urgency, that sense of purpose, felt so far from the trapped woman Kubo remembered. She was still his mother, undeniably so. She had his mother’s smile and his mother’s laugh, and his mother’s way of talking. She was just… more. More like how she had been when Kubo was young, when frailty had not overtaken her entirely.

It was difficult to get his head around the idea that she was not entirely who he had known her as. It was like drinking watered down tea your whole life and then being confronted with the real thing, powerful, sharp, and bitter.

“She’s scared,” Kubo said without meaning to, “I mean she’s always been scared of them, our family, but now she can really do something about it.” After years of hiding, action must have been sweet as it was heady.

“Yeah, she is definitely making some tracks,” Hanzo said under his breath. “Guess we should try to catch up, huh, champ?”

Kubo nodded but couldn’t help the little bit of annoyance. “You don’t have to call me that, you know. I’m not five.”

Hanzo broke into a jog, and his next few sentences were delivered as a pant of breath. “I know… It’s just I’ve never… had a kid before… not in this body at least. About to make a sharp turn!”

Sure enough, Hanzo swerved sharply, and Kubo clung all the tighter to the antlers of his helm to avoid falling off. The matching sensations of speed and exhilarating danger were all too much. He broke into laughter. His father responded by bobbing and weaving all the more, until Kubo could have sworn he was just spinning in circles.

“You had kids before,” he said between snorts of laughter. “You’re just remembering how.” For that, Hanzo dove so hard to the right that the wind whistled through his armour like an ancient flute.

Eventually Hanzo slowed down. Kubo could now hear the crunch of his mother’s skirts trailing across leaves now, and the collisions of Miss Monkey’s bare feet against soil too frozen to give. He smiled in the direction of the noises and rested his chin on the top of Hanzo’s helmet.

“I’m glad I got to meet you,” he said to his father as the sound of his mother’s movement moved forward again, too quick to keep up with even under the diminishing sun. “It is a good end to a story, I think.”

“The story’s not over yet,” Hanzo said, determined as a man about to move mountains. Kubo could not remember the stories his mother had told him, those were still lost, but they must have been something like this, full of heroism and kindness.

(No story could ever quite capture the warmth of sitting on his father’s shoulders, knowing his mother was close at hand, listening to birdsong and hoping he was going home at last.)

The woods, from what he could hear, were drawing closer around them. The rustling of leaves was ever louder and was now accompanied by the soft trickling of water and the far-off noises of animals whose shapes and names Kubo could not entirely remember.

“We’re getting close to the village,” his mother called, “I’m worried we won’t make it in time though. I’ll go ahead and find the helmet, Beetle, Kubo, you gather the villagers and get them somewhere safe. I’m worried-” she did not finish the sentence, did not say what worried her, but Kubo could fill in the blanks a tired mind left.

“Will you be safe?” Kubo asked, sliding down from his perch on his father’s back to stumble over to her. She caught him halfway and knelt.

“As safe as is possible,” she promised, pressing her face to the top of his head. “Take care of your father. Hanzo, keep him safe. If my family comes-” Again, she trailed off, the late afternoon taking a toll on her.

Hanzo clasped his hands together with a clash of armour plates. “I know.”

And then she was gone.

Kubo and his remaining parent walked together for a while, sticking close together to avoid the dangers of the forest. Kubo could feel the wind picking up, worming its way under the thin beetle robe. For once he missed his feathers. Cloudy though they’d made his mind, they had been warm.

It was a stupid thing to think. There had been nothing good in his grandfather’s kingdom. Beautiful and safe did not equate to right or virtuous- and he was not going to be taken in by the lacquered exteriors and alabaster surfaces of the masks that monsters wore.

“What does it look like?” Kubo asked, eager to remember why he’d wanted to come back to earth in the first place.

His father paused on the path. “The forest?”

“Yes. I- I feel like I should know it but whenever I try to call the images to mind they aren’t there.” All that was left was an impression of nature, a space where he had once been able to name every animal and could now only pull together snippets of feets and ears and fur. Even hearing them in the underbrush, busily scurrying about, hadn’t been enough to jog his memory.

Hanzo made a sympathetic noise, half cluck and half coo. “I know how that is. The forest- the forest is big. There are trees everywhere, taller than any castle.”

“What are they like?” Kubo prompted. “I can tell they’re missing some leaves, but I can’t remember why.”

“About half of them are missing leaves,” Hanzo corrected. “Mostly the leafy ones. The old pines and spiny bushes, those are still green and it looks like half the woods is made of skeletons and the other half is these big mossy bears.”

“Bears are fuzzy and they have good hands,” Kubo dredged up from the lake of memory. “Sometimes they eat people.”

Four hands grabbed at him quickly, making him double over in instinctive laughter. “I’ve heard they mostly eat little boys, but then again, my memory isn’t great either.”

“Stop that!”

The attack subsided. Hanzo continued. “There’s a river a little down the road, though I can’t remember when we start to see it. I’ve only been this way with your mother once. You might be able to hear it if you try though.”

Kubo concentrated, filtering through the sharp breeze and strident bird song to see if he could pick out the soft trickle of water.

He couldn’t hear the river, but he could hear a big animal stumbling through the woods, approaching them fast. Branches cracked and gave way, marking the passage of something too large to need to hide its approach.

“Something’s coming!” Kubo hissed, stepping back until he could feel his father close at hand. Hanzo tensed and pulled out his bow, but did not draw it.

The creature- no, creatures, no one thing could walk so clumsily- drew near, stumbling onto the path with a sudden quieting of sound that set Kubo’s teeth on edge. They must have frozen, surveying the pair as Hanzo looked back at them.

“Kubo!”

It was a child’s voice, shrill and clumsy. “Kubo!” another child echoed immediately, “You came back!”

Before he could strum his shamisen, Kubo found himself assailed, this time by a pair of tiny bodies. Skinny arms wrapped around his waist and squeezed while legs and other assorted limbs tried to come to a complete stop around him. Wild grass tickled his nose and chin, as if the children had been replaced with forest spirits, but no; even as oblivious as Hanzo seemed to be sometimes he would probably comment on that

Kubo hugged back, shamisen still held by the neck in one hand. He did not know who these children were, but he was clearly supposed to, and his chest hurt as if his heart had been torn out which was a sure sign of his grandfather’s dark influence.

He pulled himself out of the two-person crush as carefully as he could, barely even hearing the questions- had his mother rescued him? Was there a big battle? Did this mean he would tell stories again?

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I can’t remember.”

“Kids.” Hanzo said gently, and they pulled back at least enough to let him breath “Kubo here has had a very rough time and some of his memories of his life with you are still missing. Can you, uh, remind him of your names?”

“I’m little Kuriami, the one with the shaved head,” one of the voices said anxiously. “You used to play with my brother sometimes.”

“I’m Mari,” the more assured of them said. “You should remember me, you saved my life from the ghost witches.”

Neither name was even passingly familiar and it must have shown on Kubo’s face.

“Did I know you well?” he asked.

Mari and Little Kuriami told him a story about a wonderful boy who showed up in the town square at least once a week to weave stories of wonder and heroism- about how he lived in a cave and always went home by sundown but caught the most fireflies in the moments before twilight and could charm sweet bean buns off of village vendors better than anyone. Some parts of it seemed right, the rules, his mother, but the rest might as well have been a story about people far away in a time long ago.

Other children showed up as the story was told, and greeted Kubo with the same enthusiasm, Beetle with the same awe, and he realized that they must have loved the boy he once was.

When the tale was finally done the path was packed with children pressed close and making Kubo claustrophobic. Whatever spell had been keeping Hanzo rapt finally snapped and he tried to regain control of the situation.

“Wait, what are all of you doing out here in the forest? It’s getting late.”  
  
Mari was holding Kubo’s hand and refused to let it go. She seemed to have taken ownership of him, on the grounds that he had saved her life and that his mother had stayed with her family while she was recovering. Kubo didn’t especially mind, she seemed to be keeping everyone else at a safe distance.

“It’s the birthday festival tomorrow,” she said as if it was obvious. “And the harvest festival, I guess. It’s the first festival since the village got all burnt down. We’re getting flowers for the temple so it will be all nice when our parents take us tomorrow.”

“There aren’t very many flowers left,” a nameless boy in the mass of children confided.

“Try that again, but slower.” Hanzo instructed. “Pretend we know nothing about anything.”

“If you’re three or five for boys or seven for girls you get to dress up and get candy,” someone explained.

“You get to wear PANTS!” another exclaimed.

“Because it’s the full moon and ever since the moon became evil we’ve had bad luck with it, we need to do this one perfect.”

“Alright, stop.” Hanzo said. “It is the full moon tomorrow, isn’t it. Damn, damn, damn. Sariatu is going to have her work cut out for her. Uh, things might start to break bad very quickly, children, so we need to get all of you back home.”

Kubo held up a hand, “Wait, is anyone else still in the woods?”  
  
They all confirmed that no, they were all here.

“Right,” Hanzo sounded practically businesslike. “No one get lost, keep up a quick pace, and we’ll make it back to the village well before sundown. If not… run when I tell you to run.”

  
  
  


Sariatu has to catch her breath several times on the winding road to the village. She is not of a sprinting age anymore.

At her urging, Monkey goes ahead. If there is to be a crisis, a lone primate probably won’t be much help but she’ll be better than nothing.

The sun is not setting that fast, but she still senses danger at every corner. Something will happen- it had to. She had spent so long as her father’s proxy and she is still finely attuned to his intentions- all the ways his mind works and the callousness inherent in his being. It is the full moon soon, they haven’t been able to move that fast. It still took long days to make the trek and now they’ll pay for it.

She half expects to find the village in ruins, destroyed days ago by her sisters’ wrath, on her father’s orders. They have to know she will return. It is not the sort of thing they tolerate (had tolerated, should ever tolerate), not normally.

To her surprise and delight, Sun Village is bustling with activity.

Sariatu catches little details- the drummers checking their taiko skins to make sure they’d kept in storage, women standing on stools to string lanterns, roasting seeds over a fire- before she’s swept up in a torrent of villagers.

Questions drown her, so many she can’t focus through them.

Better her than Kubo, she reflects, staring at the faces crowding around her. After a while they all begin to blur into one another.

Slowly, the people begin to back away. Kameyo, the older lady with the gummy smile and the kind, wrinkled eyes, takes Sariatu’s hands and leads her to a porch. Monkey pats her back aggressively, as if daring anyone to get closer.

“Feeling overwhelmed, dear?” Kameyo asks from a safe distance.

“Your kindness is too much,” Sariatu explains when her tongue finds itself. “I am sorry. I-”

“Anything for Kubo!” a voice bellows and she realized the villagers are not that far after all.

Kubo. Her son. Of course, so much has happened and she owes them some explanation.

“He’s back, Kubo is back. He escaped from the Moon but my father will come for him. His mind isn’t quite right either. It does things to you, that place.”

There are gasps. Sariatu opts to ignore them.

“I need to find the last piece of the Armor of legends, so he can be defended. I need to…” She stumbles to her feet and back onto the road, trying to orient herself, looking desperately for the temple and the bell above it, ringing out to the town. The bell she had been trying to find, before her memory had been stolen from her.

She finds the pole, tall and proud and blackened by time. The Helmet is not atop it.

Sariatu whirls and grabs Kameyo, “Where is the Helmet?”

The old woman looks back in confusion.

“The bell,” Sariatu clarifies, “The temple bell- it rings at sunrise and sunset. I’ve heard it for eleven years.”

Hosato steps forward and gently pries her fingers off the elder lady’s shoulders. “The monk took it down to the river. He cleaned the whole place for the festival tomorrow, but he was worried about the bell, so we-”

That is all Sariatu needs to hear. The sun is slowly arcing downwards and- she glances at the entrance to the village, her son and husband are not to safety yet.

Monkey is already running for the forest. Sariatu turns back to the villagers before she follows her. “Get to safety,” she orders, “Please. I do not want any harm to come to you.”

“Wait!” Hosato shouts His face is panicked.  
  
Sariatu looks at him, trying to be a commanding goddess and not a tired woman who is more mortal by the minute. “ _What_?”

“The children are in the woods!”

Sariatu runs. The villagers come with her.

  
  


  
The children didn’t take long to begin pushing at the boundaries of Kubo’s memories.  
  
“Do you remember what leaves are?” a boy asked, jogging to keep up.

“I do,” Kubo confirmed as he stifled a laugh. “They have leaves on the moon.”

“What about foxes?” asks Maru-who-is-five.  
  
“No foxes.”

“But do you remember them?” he insisted.

Kubo was not sure how to phrase things to a five year old. He barely even had his own memories to rely on. “A little bit. I know it’s an animal, I guess?”

“What about octopus?” said a very small voice. After that it began to devolve into a discussion of animals, one that Kubo could almost sit out on.

Hanzo- Beetle, as the children called him, but Kubo thought that was a terrible name for a father to have- was making them keep up a steady pace. The sheer mass of small bodies kept Kubo from tripping and brace him up at the knees, but that didn’t make it any less scary to not know what was under your feet.

The jog down the uneven forest path was all too familiar. Even worse was Mari’s small hand in his. Kubo itched to yank his away because just the sense memory of it made his heart pound, but this felt like it had happened before. He needed to remember.

He had saved Mari from ghost witches. They had ran, and he had held her hand, and then something horrific had happened.

His eye, the more recently lost one, pulsed with pain.

“Are you sure we’re going the right way?” Hanzo demanded of no one in particular.

“The cemetery path is the quickest way back to the village,” a child said confidently. Kogo, Kubo’s brain supplied. She was almost his age. “The tombstones are just ahead and then it’s a straight road back.”

Mari’s grip on Kubo’s fingers tightened.

“This is where the witches found us,” she confided, “In case you can’t remember.”

Dread filled Kubo’s mouth, but he nodded.  
  
There was a soft noise from Hanzo. “Uh- there is a man in the graveyard, by the river. Is he supposed to be there?”

Kogo scoffed. “That’s the monk, sir. He’s supposed to be where ever.”

“Right… well tonight he can’t be outside when it’s dark. All of you stay right here,” Hanzo said and began to walk off. “Mister! Mister, I’m going to need you to stop washing and come with me! Yes, I understand that I do look like a large bug-”

A child tugged on Kubo’s sleeve.

“What?”

“While we’re waiting you should tell us a story,” they whispered, and the cry was promptly taken up by the others.

“Please, a story!” “Just a short one!” “You’ve got your s’amisen,”

He swung the shamisen around to his chest as if he’d done it before. “Once, there was a brave king-”

A shriek went up from his audience. “No, you have to say the thing first!”

Kubo stopped, befuddled. “What do you mean?”

Mari whispered it first, like someone imparting dark wisdom. “If you must blink, do it now.” The other children repeated it, making an uneven chant.

“If you must blink, do it now.”

Hanzo, still talking to the monk by the river, shouted, and at the exact same time, from an opposite direction, Kubo’s mother cried out.

“Our parents are here,” someone told Kubo.

“I know.”

  
  


Winter means the days become shorter, and Sariatu is shocked at how fast the sun sinks. By the time they find everyone in among the grave markers, it is already touching the horizon, dark red spreading across the sky.

Hanzo has the helmet held in his hands like a keg of burning oil and is running towards her. A mild monk in a thin cloak, soaked to the knees, is staring in shock.

She knows the night and she knows that as close as the village is, they will not make it in time.

The wide villager with the burly shoulders is closest to her, so he bears the brunt of her instructions.

“Grab everyone and run. Leave no one behind. Get inside the most sacred place you have, away from the moonlight. I’m going to hold them off.”

Hanzo is next to her now, fitting the helmet over her head. “I’ll stay too,” he says.

Her heart clenches, “You will not. You need to protect them.”

Kubo is near her now, and he grabs her in a hug. “I’ll stay, they want me.”

“You will not,” Kameyo insists, and pulls him away. Sariatu would kiss her if she had the time.

But time is running out. The armor glows golden, filling her with energy, if not clarity.

“Go,” Sariatu pleads, “I have thought so many of you dead before.”

Reluctantly, they go.

Beetle, her Hanzo, her husband, leaves last.  
  
“Please, you have always been my quest and I cannot afford to lose you so close to the end of it.”

Slowly enough that she could pull away, he kisses her. It is the sort of thing suited for bedrooms, not the sunset sky. She almost wishes her family could see.

“Take it from an experienced quester, darling. It’s not over until you come home.”

  
  
  


Father’s milky eyes widened as the shadow of night crept over the first edges of the islands. Yukami knew he had found their errant family.

“They’re down there,” he rasped, “Your arrogant sister has the entire set of amor, but it’s no matter.”

“No, certainly not, father,” Yukami agreed, “We can still defeat her.”

Next to her, Karasu, still wrapped up in her own imagination, made a small movement. Yukami knew what she was thinking. She was hoping they could bring the lost home.

Karasu was ever an creation of extremes, absolute in her anger, fervid in her devotion, and oddly pure in her rare moments of optimism. Still, Yukami held out some small, desperate hopes herself. It was not becoming, certainly, but these were unbecoming times.

The Moon King held up a hand for silence.

“You will not. I will go myself.”

And then he was gone.

All the small secret hopes Yukami had been harbouring disappeared in an instant, replaced by fear.

She twisted to look at her sister, but Karasu was oddly serene as she took off her mask. The face underneath was pale and smooth like the porcelain above, but unlike the stylized mask her true features looked more human. She looked like their sister, high eyes in an oval face, a long nose, and an oddly soft mouth that was now pursed in determination.

It had been a while since Yukami had seen her skin.

Karasu spoke, voice no longer distorted by the everpresent hollows of the mask.

“You know we have to do something.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annotations
> 
> 1\. A couple of little details in Yukami's POV scene (which I've been waiting forever to write) First, her perspective of Kaguya uses her full name Nayotake-no-Kaguya, leaving off the hime since there's no room for other princesses with Yukami around. This roughly translates to shining night of the bamboo. Kaguya's clothing is also kind of spring inspired with a junihitoe palette comprised of kōbai, kuchiba, and a really pale moegi. It's non-traditional to say the least, and very earthy, so she definitely looks eccentric. 
> 
> 2\. I figured Kubo had to be eating something on the moon, and even once I decided to use the more chinese "elixir of immortality" interpretation of the moon rabbits, I still wanted them to make mochi as well. Poor kid probably ate a lot of rice balls while he was away. 
> 
> 3\. The festival is both a slightly more pared down and antiquated version of Shichi-Go-San (a celebration marking milestones for certain young children), and a late harvest festival. Since the traditional mid autumn moon based festivals probably wouldn't appeal to the Sun Village, instead they've incorporated a version of the Niiname-no-Matsuri traditonally celebrated by the emperor in mid November. As a bonus, Shichi-Go-San naturally falls on the fifteenth which according to the old lunar calendar is the full moon! It was too good of an opportunity to pass up.
> 
> 4\. I do have more songs for my playlist, but since playmoss wouldn't let it get any longer I now have a new one! https://playmoss.com/en/grassyplain/playlist/in-quest-of-them In order from the start of this chapter.


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey so, this is it. I really don't know what else to say, but thanks for taking this ride with me everyone!

Sariatu is certain she will die.

Her father is outraged like Sariatu has never seen him before. Had never seen him- will never see him again because death bears down on her like an angry god.

His face is incandescent- glowing like a shriveled moon. Instinctive, filial fear nearly stops her heart, because in all her many, many years she has never seen something like this.

No, that’s a lie. The first time her family had tried to take Kubo he must have been angry like this, but she had forgotten long ago. It is a blur, like a smeared watercolor. Now she is rather glad she forgot.

Fear is such an inconvenient thing.

Even after years of rebellion, she still fights to stand her ground. The instinct to cower, to obey, is hard to shove down. Only the overwhelming hatred and resentment she holds for him can match it.

The sword in her hand is heavy, the shining helmet on her brow is warm, and she feels hopelessly outmatched. The last vestiges of immortal strength are wearing off and she is left with nothing but a mortal body and a half-broken mind.

Her father is looking around, blind, unfocused eyes seeming to drink in the whole clearing. Then he is looking past her, towards the path her family fled by.

That won’t do, Sariatu thinks dully. With a tongue made of iron, she tries to speak.

Her father stares at her, unseeing, disgust clear on his thin features. The words, such as they were, die in her throat.

He takes a step forward, then another, coming closer and closer to her, closer and closer to Kubo and Hanzo and all that she loves.

She says in a voice far softer than she intended, “You were never a father- you were never anything. You will never be anything but a tyrant.”

No insult is an acceptable one in the land of the gods, for immortals have high-strung tempers, but this one is perfectly designed to make her father murder her. It is everything she has wanted to say for a dozen years, and then some.

Sure enough, he stops in his tracks and grits his teeth. His desire to find Kubo first is a minor issue compared to the pride of a king.

“I hate you, I pity you, I-” Sariatu stops dead as the glow around his slim form increases. Suddenly, the blade in her hands feels insufficient.

She does not know what he will turn into to kill her- a whale with a thousand eyes, a bird from the furthest reaches of space, a drowning ocean. What matters is that he is eternal and she is just a woman now, barely even divine at all. You cannot fight a tsunami with a sword.

Kubo has her shamisen. That is a relief and a death knell. Kubo has her shamisen and she does not and her father is here.

He is a god and she is not, not anymore, but that doesn’t mean she can’t give it her best shot.

She charges him and prays, though she does not know who she is praying to. There is not a god who would raise a finger to help her.

  


  
Kubo felt like he was home.

It was a strange feeling, as he was running, once more, for his life. But there were people all around him, humans with loud voices and hot breath, humans who acted like they knew him and had loved him.

His parents weren’t exactly mortal, when it came down to it. His mother was magic that had become earthly and his father had been shaped by exposure to magic. This was the first time in forever that he had been around other human beings.

He was scared for them, of course, he didn’t want them to get caught up in his family’s fight. His gut told him the last time he had run down this dirt road something terrible had happened. That same sort of harm couldn’t befall these people he must have loved.

At the same time, their presence was reassuring. These were allies, his heart said, and those had been hard to find on the moon.

When the group finally stopped someplace with wooden floors, away from the itchy press of moonlight, he was instantly mobbed. The children were shooed aside and older humans pressed around him, asking questions after question without waiting for answers.

“What happened to your eye?”

“Are you alright, child?”

“Can you really not remember us?”

“Do you still have your magic?”

“Who’s coming after you?”

A creaky old woman’s voice cut through the chatter. “Hush, the boy can’t think straight.” A weathered hand, warm and wrinkly, took Kubo’s.

“Hello?” he said, a little confused.

“Hello yourself, young man. I’m Kameyo. What should we call you?”

Hanzo- his father- was standing at his back now, a silent reinforcement. Kubo’s mouth was dry.

“I’m Kubo. You all know me, I think, but I can’t remember any of you. I’m sorry.” The words felt flimsy as paper. Unlike paper, they did not bend to his will, but stayed weak and fluttering.

“We’ll remind you then,” the old lady says stubbornly. “There will be plenty of time for that. For now, let's focus on helping your mother, shall we?”

 _Mother_ , Kubo thought, and remembered the terror that had been temporarily overwhelmed by confusion and old memories.

“I’m going back,” Hanzo muttered.

Kubo pulled himself to his feet. “I’m going as well. I have magic.” He wasn’t going to lose his mother, not again. He’d been pulled away from her, but that didn’t mean he had to stay away.

“No! No,” Hanzo gentled his tone. “Stay here. Protect the villagers.”

There were some rustlings from the crowd- it was packed in the building and Kubo could practically feel the grumblings coming up from the foundations.

“Is the smoke going to come back?” someone whispered, and a little girl asked, “Is it the witches again?” Kubo wondered what Aunt Yukami had done here, to make these people fear her so. But there were more important things on his mind- like impending parental abandonment.

He lunged at his father, only to find himself tethered by the surprisingly strong arms of the old lady. Unable to touch Hanzo, to grab at him and make sure he was still there, he began to panic.

“Don’t leave! Not without me! You need me to fight Grandfather.”

Monkey chirruped outrage as Hanzo gasped like he had been wounded. “Please, Kubo. You need to protect the villagers.”

It was the sort of excuse even a blind person could see right through. “I’m only putting them in more danger. I escaped, I made Grandfather mad. They’re after _me_.”

His father sighed. “Oh, Kubo. They don’t like any of us very much. It’s a parent’s job to look after a child. Let us protect you.”

It was such a ridiculous statement that Kubo just had to seethe for a moment in silent rage. He had taken care of his mother for so long, when she had been helpless. He had been the one to take care of himself on the moon. He hadn’t even known his father was alive a week ago.

Furious and made even more mad by the way his emotions tumbled like a storm cloud inside him, he pointed at his face, at his empty not-eyes. “Well, you didn’t do a very good job of protecting me so far!” he snapped.

Hanzo was silent for a moment. So was everyone else. It was as if he had cast a spell of silence over the whole village, stealing even their breath.

“I know,” Hanzo said, “And you have grown up to be so brave. So indulge your parents one last time. Do us this last favor and let us try to help you as best we can.” There was a footstep on the floorboard, close to him. Something in the beetle’s voice was close to breaking, like a shamisen cord about to snap. “Kubo, I can’t let your mother see you get hurt. Not again.”

Kubo relaxed into the hug of the old woman, and buried his head in her shoulder. It was too familiar for a stranger, but they weren’t strangers, were they? He knew her, from a past life. She patted his back.

When he felt less like he wanted to scream, he raised his head and faced where he was pretty sure his father was. “I don’t want to see her get hurt either. I don’t want to see you get hurt.”

Father tapped the bridge of Kubo’s nose, where the blindfold lay across his face. “Luckily seeing probably won’t be your problem. But I understand what you’re saying. I’m really worried about her Kubo, and she’s worried about you. If you were there, she might make mistakes, dangerous ones. We both would. I just want to get her out of this alive.”

Kubo weighed the options as quickly as he could, aware that every second he spent was a second his mother was out in broad moonlight, fighting.

Dimly from afar, a scream echoed. It sounded like it came from an animal.

“Fine,” he said finally. “Go.”

His father hugged his, so briefly that Kubo barely felt all four of his arms. And then he was gone, and Kubo was alone in the dark with strangers.

To his surprise, they gave him breathing room. He could hear the little children on the other side of the space, clamoring for answers amid the rising din of humanity, but even they were being admonished to leave poor Kubo alone.

Kameyo stayed, just close enough that Kubo could hear her crackly breathing and smell a hint of must and grass. It was strange, Grandfather was old, but he wasn’t fragile like that. Grandfather really didn’t seem to have any human weaknesses at all.

Kubo clutched his shamisen tight and tried to think of a way to kill a monster.

  
  


The Sword Unbreakable does not break, but it does not stab either. Rather, it skitters helplessly off father’s thick, bony plates, leaving Sariatu to once more dive for cover.

He has not underestimated her.

The forest is getting notably deforested as the monster thrashes around. Soon there will be few places to hide.

It’s a horrible creature, one of the more horrible ones father could have produced, from a time before matter or reality when all of time and space was dark cold jelly and fiends in the night. Even an eight headed dragon would be less unholy. This is a beast from the deepest depths of space, given even more protection than usual in an effort to thwart her.

Sariatu is almost flattered at the effort.

Instead she kicks her skirts out of the way and runs for a bigger pine a few feet away, just trying to stay ahead of the destruction. Behind her, trees crack like thunder as they fall.

The huge mass of white and glowing blue moves closer, lighting up the night. Its scales are dappled with golden gilt, and some are as clear as glass, throwing reflections everywhere. At least he is easy to keep track of, but then, so is she. The armour burns gold, impossible to ignore.

A huge tail whips around, hitting the tree Sariatu is sheltering behind. She flees from the toppling trunk and looks around desperately for somewhere else to hide.

The forest is running out of trees. To her right there is the river, a flat plane of silver that reflects the moon above.  
  
Once she would have been able to walk above the water, but that is no longer an option.

Land it is then.

Father turns to confront her again, and Sariatu has to make a choice. She slides under his floating form then, before he can whip around and catch her in arm length teeth, scrambles to her feet and sprints into the thickest, darkest part of the woods.

Perhaps hiding is impossible, but she can at least buy herself space.

She needs time to think. She can’t get her thoughts in order. Battle is so much harder than it once was. There is so much coordination to it, so many little choices and evaluations.

Think, think. A warrior would know this in an instant. Dealing with an armoured enemy you go for their… weak spots, obviously. But what weakness does this form have? The underbelly is protected. The mouth has too many teeth to be safely navigated. There are nostrils, but no, the skull is sturdy there and it wouldn’t be possibly to quickly access the brain.

Then she remembers the eyes, empty full moons of silver, and curses herself. It’s easy to forget her esteemed father even possesses them, but this beast definitely does (they’re as big as her head). It would not blind him, that ship sailed long ago, but a soft target is a soft target.

Not a good plan, but a plan.

Her eye hurts.

The moon is too bright.

Father is approaching, impossible to miss, loud and lumbering. He was never one for subtlety or quickness. When you have that much power, why bother? He uses it like a battering ram.

With surprising speed, he crashes through the foliage. She backpedals, sleeve catching on a stray branch. Already she is off guard.

He takes advantage of it, lashing out with a spiny tail. It hits her in the chest, cushioned by the breastplate, but one long spike scratches across her cheek.

Bleeding, Sariatu stumbles and the creature hesitates. She has no apprehensions about his capacity for mercy. This is spite, a desire to see her in pain.

She clutches at her stomach with one hand, using the other to brace herself against a tree, and whimpers. Father moves a little closer, slowly, still not attacking.

Sariatu’s breath grows ragged and there is a laugh, twisted by monstrousness.

The tail reaches out again, spiny tendrils like fingers opening and closing as if to grab her.

She strikes.

The blade ends up embedded in his eye, almost hilt deep. Too much, the wrong angle. Sariatu tries to keep a hold of it as he shrieks and writhes, little legs snapping and tail beating the ground, but soon he’s in the air and the effort is in vain.

He has the Sword Unbreakable, or more specifically, she does not. It’s as good as gone again.

Touching her bleeding cheek gingerly, Sariatu starts looking around for a sturdy stick. Outlined against the sky, her father wheels and wails.

The motions seem heavy now- futile. There is no way she can win.She doesn’t even know how to slow him down significantly.

This is a nightmare, and for the first time in her life, she is a human woman.

Tired. Fragile. Old

The screaming above stops. Sariatu turns to face the monster charging for her.

“I did love you once!” she shouts.

He does not stop.

“You were my Father! My family!” She throws the stick in her hands like a javelin at the oncoming behemoth and is unsurprised when it doesn’t swerve.

She ducks.

A dozen pairs of tiny legs grab at her, catching her hair, her clothes, the edges of her armor. Her helmet is torn off before she can stop it. She presses herself closer to the ground and shimmies out of the armor, leaving it and her outermost robe on the ground like molted skin.

Sariatu continues to run, shedding silk until she is left in just her aka-hakama and white under kimono. She feels exposed, a beetle without a shell, and she cannot stop running. She cannot look back. She cannot blink, or she is lost.

The forest is dark without magic to light the way and there is no tell-tale blue glow behind her. She hesitates and glances over her shoulder, only to find that she isn’t being pursued.

A clever warrior would take advantage of this unforeseen gift and keep getting space between them and an unbeatable enemy. But Sariatu isn’t in this to protect herself, and there is suddenly a new worry stuck in the back of her throat.

Her child is somewhere in the world back there, hiding and probably scared (and knowing Kubo, angry).

Heart racing, Sariatu starts running again, this time in the other direction.

When she sees eye-searing moonglow, her father in the same place she left him, relief overwhelms her.

Then she hears the voice, faint, beaten, but still cocky.

“... got a good ring to it, don’t you think?”

Beetle, Hanzo, her love and her life and her stars, is in her father’s grip. He’s turning purple as he loses his breath.

The Moon King snarls, “When are you all going to learn- there _are_ no heroes here.”

The rest passes in a strange blur. Beetle is thrown into the air, Beetle is between the monster’s teeth, there is a sickening crack of carapace, and a shrill sound from her own lips that is not quite a scream and not quite a gasp.

She runs to him and presses her hands to his chest where a jagged line runs down his thick shell. There is a clear fluid leaking out, thick and hot like tears.

Her husband looks at her with his reflective eyes and sighs. Sariatu doesn’t know much about humans, or dying, but it sounds contented. She can imagine him now, saying something horribly cheesy, like, _"I finally completed my quest,"_ or _"I love you."_

There isn’t anything else she can do but wrap her arms around him and stroke his face. It is more than they got the first time they thought he died.

Eventually, after centuries, she remembers _him_.

He’s still hovering over her, watching with his one eye. She contemplates pulling the Sword Unbreakable out of the other one, but it’s too far, too inaccessible.

“This is how it ends, then,” the Moon King says, sounding almost disappointed.

 _A million years I lived, 20 of them happy,_ Sariatu thinks, clutching her love to her chest. _All stories must end_.

She screws her eyes shut.

There is a bright light. Through her lashes, Sariatu glimpses her family running forward, full of determination.

Kubo is golden as the armor, glowing with the power of the heavens, without her curse or her sorrow. Her sisters are streaks of shadow next to him, like the afterimage left when you look directly into the sun.

_Oh._

  
  


“Kubo! Kuuubo! Little boy.”

There were human shrieks and Kubo rocketed to his feet, fingers poised over his shamisen strings.

He knew his aunts’ voices. They were here.

“Kubo, please, we don’t want to hurt you.”

“You always say that,” he said, uncertainly, waiting for the carnage to start. Hands gently directed him towards the front of the building- he could feel air coming in through an open door. People were already clambering to get away from the opening, a sure sign that Yukami and Karasu were there.

He pushed his way through the crowd to face them. There was no reason for these humans to get hurt. To his surprise, however, the villagers wouldn’t let him go alone. A few bulky farmers in rough clothes and Miss Monkey of course ranged around him, until he was almost entirely shielded from his aunts. When Kubo tried to peer around them, they pushed him back.

“Kubo…” Karasu whispered, and Yukami finished her sentence with a snap, “Come away from those creatures.”

“We won’t let you take him again,” a woman warned, her voice shaking.

The aunts ignored her. “Kubo, where is your mother?” one of them asked urgently.

Kubo glowered at them. “Don’t you know? She went to fight grandfather.”

“The beast outside,” Yukami murmured, “I thought it was only the insect- you don’t think she was foolish enough to face him as well.”

“Why would that human let her get near him!” Karasu demanded, “What good is he?”

There was a pensive silence. Outside even the crickets didn’t chirp.

“There’s nothing that can be done,” his aunts agreed in unison. “Kubo, you need to come with us. We need to get you away from here.”

“No!” shouted a husky voiced human.

“You can’t take him,” screamed a child, the girl Mari from before, “Please don’t take him.”

“Just you try,” bellowed someone with bad breath, too close for comfort. A sword rasped out of a sheath.

Monkey would have lunged at them if Kubo hadn’t caught her. She was like his mother, and like his mother her mistrust of the women in from of them ran deep.

Trying to forestall a riot, or worse, a massacre, Kubo plucked a note. It rippled like a shockwave, creaking the wood of the building and making people totter back a step. After it died down there was a sort of shocked calm. He stepped around his self appointed guard.

“Auntie, what do you mean? Where do you want to take me?”

“Somewhere else,” Yukami said cryptically, and Kubo knew even they hadn’t the slightest idea. They weren’t planners, they’d always had his mother and grandfather for that. At best they had tactics, not strategy. Most of those tactics involved violence.

He shook his head. “I’m not leaving without my parents. This family is going to stick together for once.”

“You’ll die,” Yukami told him, with a little regret.

Kubo drew in a deep breath.

“Not if you help me with grandfather.” He couldn’t say kill, not now, not in front of them. No matter how angry Kubo was he knew that they still loved him with the strange love of children for a terrible father.

“That would be…” Karasu said, before her words abandoned her. Yukami hadn’t even tried to say anything. Her stony silence was response enough.

“Please, I know it seems frightening, but he’s not going to stop. He’s so full of hate for this world, for every world that doesn’t fit his idea of what’s perfect and right. He wants a paper family to fold into shapes but that’s not us! That will never be us! None of us will ever be enough, and so he’ll hate us, and we won’t be safe.”

Kubo walked forward, blindly, until he found himself in their arms. Cold hands hesitantly stroked his hair and patted his cheeks as if to dry his tears. There were no tears. He was done crying, their family had been a tragedy for too long.

“If you love me even a little,” he said into the plates of Karasu’s armor and a swathe of feathers, “Help me. Help _her_. Help us.”

“Once,” Yukami said slowly, testing every word like it might collapse under her, “we were three. Once, we were a sword, poised to strike at the heart of our enemies. We were more powerful then. Perhaps, powerful enough for… this.”

Karasu gripped Kubo’s hand tightly as if to ask his permission. She didn’t need to. He was already decided.

There was one more person Kubo had to convince. Monkey radiated suspicion. Kubo tried to look confident, for her sake. “I won’t be safe if I don’t do this,” he said. “You try to find my parents and look after them, please.”

She ambled forward and dropped something into his hands. It took Kubo a moment to realize it was his bachi.

He turned to the villagers.

“Thank you, all of you. I wish I could remember your names. You should- you should stay here. It will be safer.” He’d remember them. The children. Kameyo with the wrinkly hands and the short, sharp laugh. He’d remember them this time.

There was a cough. One of them, one Kubo recognized as one of the self appointed spokespeople of the group, stepped forward.

“We’ll tell you our names when you come back, how about that?” He pressed some a thick sheaf of paper into Kubo’s hand. “Here, I think one of the shopkeepers has been saving this for your return. You might as well use it, right?”

Kubo enjoyed the feeling of crisp washi for a moment. Some of the sheets were as thin as tissue, but they still had the right stiffness for origami. All the edges were clean, no folds yet marred them. Already, the paper was growing warm to the touch.

Moving swiftly, he took one sheet and folded a bird, then plucked each shamisen string once. Paper wings came to life with a flutter, and then that flutter turned into a storm as every sheet flew around Kubo, folding and unfolding in a tornado of birds, insects, and flying fish. There were cheers.

A few of the origami creatures were tugging on Kubo’s clothes and hair, leading him towards the door. They’d be able to see what he couldn’t. On either side of him he could feel feathers, long and plush. His aunts were as eerily still as ever, but he could feel their fear, like a tightness in the air.

“Let’s go.”

  
  


Yukami reaches Sariatu first, while Karasu is busy wrapping chains around their father’s tail and paper birds are trying to peck out his remaining eye. She grabs her by the upper arm and wrenches her roughly away from Hanzo.

“Move, we’ll take care of this.”

Sariatu doesn’t let her husband go.

With a sigh, Yukami drags them both with a strength Sariatu can’t even remember having, and drops them a yard away. Monkey bounds forward and pulls them the rest of the way into the forest, out of the path of danger, but not before letting out a cry when she sees what’s happened to Beetle.

She’s as heartbroken as Sariatu feels, a loud, outspoken heartbreak. Selfish as it is, she’s glad at least someone is still alive enough to get mad. Her friend, her companion, barely wastes a moment before rushing at the Moon King with Beetle’s fallen sword. It skitters off his back helplessly, and Monkey herself is thrown back. She lands feet from Sariatu, pale fur matting with blood. At least she seems to be alive.

Sariatu can barely move. She has no more magic, and even this frail human body is starting to fail on her. But she cannot help but watch. It is one part fear, one part fascination.

Her heart still hurts from shock of seeing her sisters there, her sisters who she loves loving something back. Even they can learn, it seems.

They’re doing rather well.

Yukami’s demon twists around the Moon King’s form, tangling and trapping him. Karasu’s scythe digs into a chink in his armor previously unfound. And Kubo directs it all like a musician directing a play, his hands flying as he plays faster and faster. The music is oddly upbeat, for such a desperate battle.

She believes they’ll win, for one sanguine moment.

Then the Moon King throws his head back and screams.

It sounds like a shamisen.

Perhaps it was foolish to believe a god from a time before instruments would need one to work his magic. The effects are immediate and staggering.

The fire demon blows away like smoke on a breeze. Karasu tumbles back and has to duck to avoid the kusarigama that goes flying past her head. Kubo’s helpers crumple to the ground as his music stops. He’s walking back now, one hand up to ward himself against an enemy he can’t even see but whose power is tangible in the air.

Sariatu wants to go to him but she can barely move. Her limbs no longer feel quite hers. A small, fatalistic part of her suspects she might be dying.

 _He was only playing_ , she thinks, and feels her hands sticky with her husband’s blood. We wanted a fight, so he went along with it- it makes for a better song that way. The great battle between good and evil, that is what all the stories are about. But you can’t kill something like him with weapons. You can’t overpower something so powerful.

Only one thing in her entire life has ever matched the power of the heavens.

She gathers up the last of her strength and shouts, “Kubo! Remember why you’re here! Remember what he can’t see!”

Then she topples over, and all she can see is the ground.

(But she hears the music.)

  
  
  


His mother was alive.

Kubo had been terrified when they’d first reached Grandfather and he’d heard nothing- no cry of relief, no quip from his father. His mother’s words, hoarse and cryptic, were a lifeline in a sea of darkness.

The sound of Aunt Yukami’s foot hitting the ground next to him was another. An instant later Aunt Karasu was on the other side of him, her breathing heavy.

Whatever Grandfather had done- that terrible, discordant _sound_ \- it wasn’t great. They weren’t winning. Despite every promise folk songs had made, the good guys weren’t succeeding despite all the odds.

_Remember what he can’t see._

What use was that? Grandfather couldn’t see anything. Sometimes he refused to hear things too, if he didn’t like them or they didn’t support the world he had built for himself. He was blind in two ways, but that didn’t make him any easier to fight. His hatred for the earth definitely hadn’t made it his weakness.

Kubo held the neck of his shamisen, ready to play at a moments notice, and tried to think in terms of magic.

How did stories always go?

How had his mother’s story gone?

Karasu made another charge at the Moon King, only to be knocked back. When she landed, she made a noise Kubo had never heard her make before, almost a whimper. It was strange to hear out of her mouth.

A breeze was picking up. Yukami was pulling him back and he had a sudden sense of looming. Something was approaching, and they were retreating.

Luckily, Grandfather had always been the talkative type.

“All my daughters, traitors to the last,” he said. It was venom, every beat. “A passel of ungrateful brats, and what have I done to deserve this?”

Yukami was silent. Karasu was still breathing heavily on the ground behind them, and every now and then her breath would hitch with pain. She didn’t even need to breathe normally.

Kubo had been terrified, of course, but after almost a straight hour of terror it had morphed into a generalized malaise. Time dulled even fear. Now he was scared again, not for himself but for his aunts. It was his fault they were here. It was his fault they’d done this.

It was his fault they’d loved him, against all odds.

They kept retreating, but Kubo moved in front of Yukami, waving off her hands as she tried to pull him back.

“Grandfather, I know you cannot understand this,” he pleaded. “I know it must be confusing to you, and that you must be angry. You are the sort of person who gets angry at things that they don’t understand. But I don’t want this to end badly. Please- be a family with us. Stop trying to make us love you and _let_ us love you for once.”

They reached where Karasu was laying and Yukami helped her to her feet.

“I don’t want to hurt you,” Kubo finished, staring into the great dark space in front of him. “Not anymore.”

The Moon King growled, “I killed your father, and you offer a forgiveness that is not yours to give? You really are human after all- impudent, rash, and ignorant.”

Kubo’s chest tightened. “My father… it, it doesn’t matter. Well, it does, but you’re still my grandfather. I still want this story to have a happy ending.”

There were other sounds on the outskirts of his perception, windows banging and soft human gasps. Too late, he realized they’d walked themselves right back into the village.

Grandfather didn’t seem to notice the humans. He wasn’t the sort to. He was too wrapped up in his rage. “And what is the unhappy ending, child?” he challenged, spitting each word.

Kubo held out a hand, palm up, to his side. Yukami laid her hand and Karasu’s in it, and Kubo interlaced their fingers and moved his hand back to the belly of the shamisen, ready to play (probably badly, but he didn’t think magic cared).

“I think,” he said, “It’s more a sad ending than anything.”

He plucked a note. It reverberated longer than it should have, which was promising. His good hand, unencumbered by his aunts, fingered the neck, planning out the notes.

“One where a very sad old man is blind to the world.”

Another note.

“He can’t see anything. He can’t see how much his daughters love him. He can’t see how happy one of them is on Earth, and how unhappy the other two are without her. He can’t see how much his grandson hurts when he takes him away from his home.”

This time Kubo plucked two strings at once, making a chord that hummed in his bones.

“He hurts them all and he barely notices, or maybe he doesn’t care. When they try to help each other, to help themselves, he gets angry because he thinks they’re being difficult, when all they want is for someone to love them-”

“Enough!” Grandfather snapped and rushed towards them, an oncoming weight that Kubo could feel in his mind even if he couldn’t see it. He strummed a note as low as his mother’s voice. The weight never hit.

“Listen! All they want is a family. He cannot see that, no matter how many times they show him, how many times they tell him. He refuses to see. He will not see the earth, or human beings, or his own family. He will not see love, he will never see love, no matter how many chances he gets! And because of that, he doesn’t realize the power there is in it, the power there is here.”

His father, Hanzo, was dead. But he had played with him, heard his voice and held his hand. He’d held Kubo on his shoulders and made jokes as dumb as they were funny. This time, he wasn’t going to forget.

“Our memories are so much stronger than you know. This place, this love, has something you’ll never understand. No matter how hard you try to rip us apart, no matter how many times you take our memories, we’ll always be stronger than you.”

Karasu squeezed his hand.

 _Once we were a sword_ , Yukami had said. Now it rung in his head again, an offer.

Kubo didn’t want a sword. This was his grandfather, and he realized he didn’t want to see him hurt. He just didn’t want him to be able to hurt anyone else anymore.

He imagined a piece of paper folding and unfolding, taking new shapes every time. Grandfather had made a world out of paper, had made himself out of paper as well. He was hollow, like origami. Kubo could remake him.

“If you want to be blind to the world, then be blind. But stop hurting us.”

He played a song and imagined a great monster, something big with a dragon’s teeth and three tails, unfolding. He imagined it becoming something harmless. As pathetic and simple as Grandfather really was- with no room for complexity or love.

The song died out. Something metallic clattered to the ground.

“Is it over?” Kubo whispered.

“Yes,” his aunts said together,not quite synchronized, like dissonant music. “Yes, Kubo.” Yukami continued. “It is.”

  
  
  


Grandfather had turned into a beetle.

He wasn’t a stag beetle, at least. His horn was in the rhino shape, more forward, less separated. The tip of it formed a tiny crescent moon. He fought to escape from Kubo’s grasp, pincers clicking wildly. Kubo tried to ignore him and focus on the sturdy paper box coming together under his hands. He needed a place to live. Kubo wasn’t about to give up on him yet.

He’d seen beetles with the hearts of men before. If his father could do it, an unfathomably old diety probably could.

“He’s so pretty,” one of the children sitting next to Kubo gushed. “He looks like the inside of a shell.”

“Do you know how to keep a beetle?” asked Kuriami helpfully. “They like leaves and fruit.”

“It’s so big, it’s like ginormous,” another child said in a hushed whisper. “You would need such big leaves.”

“He’s very old,” Kubo told them, “Older than all of you. It makes sense that he’d be big.” Hopefully he’ll live for a while, Kubo wasn’t sure how sturdy beetles are but this one was magic.

The box, folded out of a dozen or so pieces of paper, layered and reinforced, was finished. It was sturdy and had tall sides, hopefully tall enough to keep Grandfather trapped for a little while. He dumped the wriggling insect in and closed the lid quickly.

The disappointment was audible. There were some sighs.

“Can we come see him tomorrow?” Kuriami asked.

“And you can tell a story!” Mari adds, sounding delighted about the proceedings for the first time. “I miss the stories, even if you did bring them back with you.”

Kubo caught a more adult laugh from the outskirts of the gaggle surrounding him, and a whisper about “Finally getting a proper ending.”

Confusion pulled at his organs again, tugging his lungs down and his heart up and his stomach in three directions at once. He didn’t know what they were talking about. He didn’t know what story to tell.

“I don’t-”

“Children,” someone said in a soothingly low voice. “I know tonight has been very exciting, but your parents are going to want to see you. There is still the festival tomorrow morning as well.”

With great reluctance his harassers dispersed, leaving mostly older footsteps, more shallow breathing. He was still surrounded, but not crowded, which was a small improvement.

Someone sat next to him on the wooden porch.

“Hello?” Kubo said hesitantly.

“Ah, hello. I just wanted to make sure you were well. I know young people can be a bit much.” It’s a mild, mincing voice for a mild seeming man, but there was a hint of good humor underneath.

“I just don’t want to disappoint anyone.” Kubo admitted, wishing his aunts would come back from finding his mother, bringing his father’s body back. (He didn’t even know what had happened to Monkey, and that scared him.) “I fought so hard to come back to earth, and now I don’t know who I am.”

“That does sound difficult. But while you might not know who you are, we do. And the people here love you, dearly.” He did not say love like a man who bandied about the word easily.

“But what if I’m not that person anymore!” Kubo cried. “What if I’m different and I can’t remember how to be the same.”

“Now listen here, young storyteller,” Kameyo cut in. She moved surprisingly lightly for someone of her age. Kubo could only just make out the thump of her cane on the wood, “Let me tell you a story. My husband was a fisher and not a bright one. Sometimes he went out in even the most terrible of storms. And one day he came home with a bad injury. He hit his head. Was sick for weeks, shaman said he might die.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Kubo said, feeling embarrassed.

“Not yet, wait a bit. He recovered and lived another ten years. But he was never quite the same. He drifted off. Sometimes he would cry at jokes. He was different, maybe not the man I’d married. But still a sweet man. Your mother isn’t the woman who washed up on our beach years ago. But she is still kind and courageous- you can see it in her eyes. Maybe you aren’t the Kubo who left this village. Maybe you are a new boy. But you seem just as good as the one we lost, just as smart and brave. So I don’t think we’ll mind.”

Kubo held the box in his lap. “Thank you, I think. Can I ask, what sort of stories did I tell before? Everyone seems to remember them.”

There was a long silence. Then the man said, gingerly, “Well, they were about a warrior, fighting to find his family.”

“To rescue them from an evil king,” a woman added as the wind picked up.

“Yes. And you would always start them in the strangest way. You would say… what was it-”

“‘If you must blink, do it now,’” Kameyo said, pitching her voice low like a thespian on stage.

That sounded about right, Kubo thought, as jokes continued around him, a comfortable stream of life and humanity that he could let himself float in. That sounded like something Kubo from the Sun Village would do.

He started to think of a new story, one to tell tomorrow. It was about a woman trapped on the moon who had long forgotten what it meant to be human, until a little prince reminded her. There would be sword fights and monsters and rabbits, and she would get to escape too and go on adventures on the earth. And there ought to be, he thought, a giant chicken.

  
  
  


Yukami heaves Sariatu up like a bag of potatoes. Even turned traitor, she clearly hasn’t let go of all her grudges. If she had she wouldn’t be the sister Sariatu knows (and loves).

There are humans with her. One is bandaging Monkey’s wounds. A few of them and Karasu are kneeling over Beetle’s body.

Sariatu looks away and lets her eyes slide shut. Yukami slaps her.

“Stay awake, you utter fool. I just betrayed father to keep you alive, you aren’t allowed to die until we get home.”

That’s enough to wrest Sariatu away from the charming embrace of death. She punches her sister in the shoulder. “Absolutely not. You will not take Kubo back to that place.”

“Then where shall he go?”

“He needs to stay here,” Sariatu insists, pulling free of Yukami’s death grip. “He will stay here. My- Monkey will raise him.”

She hadn’t planned on Beetle dying. He was supposed to be the one who lived, the one who took care of Kubo. Hanzo was human once and he could be human again. He could remind Kubo what it was like to be a human child in a dying world. The villagers would have loved him, big and strong and capable even in the sun. Kubo would have been provided for, protected.

Monkey is not quite a human role model, but she is competent enough, and she’s strong. She’ll do. She’ll have to do. Sariatu has to trust that the magic holding her together is strong enough to last and that the people here, forgiving as they have been of one or two magical debacles, will not balk at a primate neighbour.

Yukami stiffens, appalled. “He can’t live here! It’s _horrible_.” She’s loud enough that others must hear her, but they pay no mind, aside from a few, knowing chuckles.

“He needs to,” Sariatu insists, “You know he is something exceptional. His powers will only grow, and the more they do the more trouble will come to him. He may be a hero one day,” she says as if he isn’t her hero already, “and a hero needs to be human. He needs to know what mortality means, what it feels like. He needs to know loss and love and all those things, or he’ll never be any better than we were.”

They had been such monsters in their youth, trailing death and destruction, unaware of their own capabilities or their responsibilities. There was no mercy in the minds of creatures who didn’t understand death, and no capacity for change for those who had known only eternity.

Yukami tilts her head. “Is that why you’re trying to die on him?” It’s delivered in a tone of empty curiosity, but Sariatu can sense the anger underneath.

“I am… not well.” She’s managed to stay upright so far, the night bolstering her, but it’s difficult. The world blurs around her like a paste and tissue picture, everything becoming a soft wash.

Yukami’s hand goes to her side and for one moment, Sariatu thinks she’s going to stab her. Instead she pulls out a little bottle and carefully measures something into the lid.

She hold it out. “Here, drink this.”

Sariatu recoils from the silvery liquid inside. It feels cold to look at, the elixir of immortality. It rolls of its own accord, like one great amoeba, tossing and turning and throwing back pale reflections of the world.

“No! Not again.”

“Yes,” Yukami insists, shaking the little capful. “You clearly used up whatever I gave you last time. It was… not a kind thing when I chose to do it then, but this is a kindness.”

“You would try to save me my freezing my heart,” Sariatu accuses. “Little sister, I love you, but I can’t go back to living that way.”

She all but hisses. “This isn’t for you, you ungrateful maniac. This is for your son. He deserves a mother, at least until he’s old enough to be on his own. Look, it’s barely ten years at the rate you burn through it.”

Sariatu hesitates, if only because it’s so strange to see Yukami putting someone else first.

“Drink it,” she says. “Or I will force it down your throat. The boy has had enough sadness for one day.”

It really is unfair to use Kubo against her. Sariatu takes the tiny cup in a quivering hand and raises it to her lips. Behind her blank mask, Yukami seems unimpressed.

Then she down the whole four drops. Predictably, it makes her want to collapse to the ground in pain. The elixir burns and it weighs heavily on the tongue, making it all but impossible to fully get rid of the aftertaste of bitter herbs and heavy metals.

When she straightens, head pounding, and pushes her hair out of her face, both the twins are in front of her. Karasu pushes a bundle of her clothing and the Armor of Legends into her arms, then balances the Sword Unbreakable on top, before promptly going back to a fierce whispered conversation with her twin.

Sariatu hears the words, “...what do you mean, you’re _leaving_ ,” said with such betrayal she feels drawn to intervene before there’s a murder.

“Care to share, dear sisters?” she asks. Karasu spins, looking almost… guilty?

“No.” Yukami tells her. “No, we don’t.”

“We were just discussing what to do about home,” Karasu says, “Yukami is going to go back and claim father’s throne.”

“I may have to duel Amatsu-mikaboshi for it,” Yukami opines, almost to herself. Sariatu had almost forgotten the Lord of the North Star, who was older than father and yearned for the power he’d had long ago, when he’d ruled all the stars and not just one.

“And I think, after that I will leave,” Karasu says. “Many things have happened. I would like to travel until I feel less disturbed by them.” It is delivered with the utmost calm- the Moon King’s daughters were raised well, but Sariatu knows her, she knows how difficult this must be.

“You should come visit us sometimes,” Sariatu offers, barely hoping for reconciliation.

Karasu looks around, at the ruined forest and the dark sky and the graveyard just visible down the path. “I don’t want to,” she tells Sariatu frankly. “This place is distasteful. But perhaps I will.”

Yukami seems like she might fall apart. It must be hard for her, to lose her last support in such a trying time. Sariatu has faith that she’ll survive, however. Without father looming, she might even flourish.

The villagers have managed to roll Beetle’s body into a shroud. Hashi and Mitsu the dyer’s wife are carrying him.

Monkey, thoroughly swaddled in bandages, beckons Sariatu over. It seems it’s time to go home.

It’s just as well. Sariatu can see bits of purple starting to appear on the horizon, sunrise waiting to pounce. She feels like she could sleep for a month again, but not without hugging her son first.

She turns to her sisters. “Are you coming? Kubo will want to talk to you before you go.”

Startled, they begin to trail after the party of villagers, two ominous godly crows hanging between them and the sky.

And that’s it. She feels different inside, not cured, but different. Yukami’s unorthodox won’t last forever, or even heal every piece of her mind, but she feels, clearer. Even her grief is less muddled.

She touches her scar absently and her hand comes away with tears. The man she loves is dead, but her son is alive, but her sisters are speaking to her, but the fear that has ruled her life since Kubo was born has finally been lifted. She feels a thousand things at once, and for the first time in years it isn’t overwhelming. That’s enough.

The sun was coming up on the Sun Village.

And that really was the least of it.

  


* * *

 

 

 

Monkey laid a hand on Kubo’s shoulder, pulling him out of his reverie of prayer.

“Is it time to go?” he asked, and she squawked in agreement. He could feel the light fading, the air cooling and the light on his neck dimming. He gave his father’s grave one last brush, then stood and started walking home.

It was slow going, especially when he didn’t let Monkey help him. The measured, sweeping steps of someone checking the ground in front of them for obstructions didn’t lend themselves towards sprints. But he was trying to learn the softer, more unstable earth of spring and he couldn’t do that with someone holding his hand.

By the time they made it back to the village the feeling of sunlight on his skin was almost completely gone. Out of habit he ran the last few steps and dove through the doorway before the sun could disappear, running straight into his mother in the process.

“Hello,” she said, from the ground, laughing. At least she was awake, days were always hard on her. “And hello Monkey.”

“Sorry,” Kubo apologized and helped her up, hoping he hadn’t disturbed any of her work. Their new home wasn’t big, and so much of it was taken up with paper, folded into good luck noshi and butterflies for weddings, and shide and hitogata for priests who came through. He hadn’t known there was so much you could do with magic, or for that matter with a sheet of old paper.

The paper wasn’t just folded anymore either, she did even more arcane things to it, and came back with kites, fans, or lanterns. She had even threatened to make an umbrella.

Their home always smelled like mulberry fibers, drying ink, and warm silk. Today there was something else too, something that smelled delicious.

“Nomura dropped off some venison when she picked up the mended bowstring today,” Mother said. “I put it in the soup for tonight.”

She always over boiled meat, but Kubo wasn’t about to complain. He scooted over to the fire, in a paper-exclusion zone in the middle of the room, and used a spoon to fish some of the piping hot concoction.

“It’s not dinner time yet,” his mother said, and he wrinkled his nose. “Tell me what you did today.”

Mouth still burning, Kubo told her. He told her about catching frogs in the river, and hunting for mushrooms with children whose names he still had to be reminded of every few days. He didn’t tell her about visiting his father, because some wounds were still fresh.

While he tried to steal some more food, Monkey talked to his mother, strident but incomprehensible vocalizations meriting increasingly disappointed “I see”s. She was such a tattler. It was a shame she didn’t have a proper tail or he’d call her a tattle-tail.

“Kubo?”

Kubo swallowed hastily. “Yes?”

“I miss him too.”

Sometimes she sounded so sad, like she’d forgotten that they’d won. He shook his head. “Well, he wouldn’t want us to. This story doesn’t end when he does.”

“No, I suppose not.”

They were quiet for a moment, even Monkey falling still, and Kubo reveled in the joy of being near her. The noise of the village outside, so different from the quiet cave, continue unabated.

“It looks crowded today,” Mother observed, “I suppose a lot of people came by to talk about starting planting, or whatever it is farmers do.”

Kubo felt around for his shamisen, hastily thrown to the side when he’d come in. Instead he found hers. She must have been tuning it- it was a persnickety, human contraption. “Do you want to play for them?” he asked.

She was smiling. “Only if you do.”

These evening events were both an imposition and a delight. Today Kubo wasn’t feeling too imposed upon.

He grabbed her shamisen and bolted out the door, leaving her and Monkey to catch up at their leisurely old lady pace. She could jump into the song when she arrived.

Like a fifth sense, he could feel the moon rising to the east, facing him, watching him.

A few more for the audience then. At least he didn’t get stage fright.

Still moving, Kubo started to play.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Notes  
> 1\. The second playlist, for these last few chapters, is still up here. (https://playmoss.com/en/grassyplain/playlist/in-quest-of-them). One song I liked a lot just lyrically was Sato No Aki (the second to last one)- see if you can find an English translation!  
> 2.The monster here is probably a little tougher than the monster in the movie. I do think that the Moon King was, one way or another, kind of playing around with Kubo. He takes Sariatu a lot more seriously.  
> 3\. I learned a lot of interesting things about washi paper. It's actually very tough and had a pseudo religious quality in historical Japan due to associations with power and wealth. There's a lot to be said about the symbology of paper in the movie. It's definitely expensive. The villagers spent some money on this coming-home gift.  
> 4\. I actually forgot to do anything with Monkey for a few scenes and had to write her back into the narrative.  
> 5\. Kubo is very much choosing his own story here. And as he tells his story, the world reshapes itself around him. Because no one has more unshakeable faith in themselves than a twelve year old boy, let me tell you.  
> 6\. I contemplated killing off the Moon King, as payment for saving the sisters, but that seemed unfair. Only, uh, one person dies in this story. And I've had that death planned since the beginning and I'm not going to apologize for it. So instead the Moon King becomes a giant rhinoceros beetle- a proper, fairytale, karmic fate. And since he's probably still immortal he's going to spent the next twenty years being fed overripe fruit by loud children as punishment for his sins.  
> 7\. I do want to make it clear that I'm not _curing_ Sariatu of her disability here. She's still cognitively impaired, to some extent, and very much a child of heaven trapped on Earth. But that doesn't mean she doesn't deserve a chance. She's fading, but she's not gone yet. Yukami gave her a bit more energy, a few more years, and even if you're a bit fuzzy up top, those years can still be good ones.  
>  8\. Speaking of Yukami, my personal headcanon is that she and Kaguya end up a highly volatile power couple. Just two moon princesses, trying to figure out how to love.  
> 9\. There are a lot of other things I want to say, but I'll spare you a walkthrough of the whole writing process. Just wanted to say again- I love you all lots and hope to see you again. I'm on tumblr at herenortherenearnorfar.tumblr.com. Feel free to pop by.


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